10 tips to overcome the FINAL SEMESTER of your university life

I have certainly not read nor seen anyone writing on the above topic. I am almost done with my studies, waiting for my final exam. How I wish there was someone who could advise me the do's and dont's of the most critical period of my university life.

I had a a very difficult time to find internship placement. When looking back, I feel that I might have missed some major opportunities. Its disappointing but definitely not at all worth repeating. 

So here I present to you 10 tips to overcome the FINAL SEMESTER of your university life:-

1) Decide ahead which industry you would like to enter into. Learn about the industries and choose the company from the industry you would like to work.

2) If possible try to connect with any of the professionals working in the company. A little insider information and referral wouldn't hurt at all infact, it would be most desirable pain in the world.

3) For some final years, you would need to complete your final year project. I had to. It's crucially important for you to manage your time. I know its easy to say. Trust me on this, you will really need this.

4) Connecting back to no. 3, you will also be busy looking for internship and receiving request for interviews and such. So it makes even more important for you to manage your time.

5) Now you are about to finish/ have finished. What's next? "I don't know" Jangan la risau! Don't worry my dears. Steve Jobs once said " You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in the future." So keep looking, keep trying, keep failing and never give up.

6) Learn to manage your expenses. Most of those who will do their internship in their hometown will not really have to worry about this. But those who will be doing their internship in areas like KL need to face the heavy lash back of the high cost of living especially when you are an intern and your allowance is very low. So plan ahead. You do not want to burden your family, do you? 

7) Share your experiences with your juniors. You were once just like them. Be their mentors and guide them to right path and support them. Karma will make sure you get what you give! ;)

8) Leave all your enmity, hatred behind and extend your hand of friendship. This will probably be the last time you will be seeing them around.

 9) Do not forget to thank your lecturers and mentors. Go and say your farewell. Even better if you can prepare small gifts for them. They will be your strongest supporters and life long connections for many years to come.

10) Lastly, do not stress out and make sure you are happy and healthy. Take care of yourself. You are also just as important as all those above points.

Cheers for quick post!

Good day!

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When was the last day you had fun?

I went to a beach side, a place called Rompin about 1 hour from where I live, with my friends and lecturer on a typical weekend. The place is famous for the fish shown in the picture. I do not know the name of the fish.

Ohh! The weather was just perfect and I couldn't have been happier. When I look at the sea, I am intrigued by the infinite horizon yet somehow it presents a hope that there may be, just may be something waiting far beyond yonder.

Coming from a landlocked country, I really enjoy strolling around beaches and feeling the rush of waves under my feet.

The last time I had fun was, I do not remember. I think I have been too occupied with "matters of consequences" that I have just forgotten how to have fun. When was the last time you had fun; when you had been really really happy?

What kind of foot-mark are you going to leave behind?

My happy weekend ended here!

Gratitude 14: I am grateful that I am surrounded with peace and tranquility.

Cheers for another successful post!

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MANANG, The Land of Spiritual Enlightenment

My uncle sent me some awesome pictures and video  from his recent trip to Manang. For those who haven't read my second post "Roots", Manang is my hometown. It's a beautiful place filled with vibrant nature, culturally rich and  friendly hosts.

Although, I have been there only once but I absolutely loved the experience. We hiked for 3 days and finally reached the headquarter of Manang also known as Chame. Its a very cold and windy place and one can easily get sun burnt.

I hope to go there again!

Here is a short video!

Gratitude 13: I am grateful that I belong to a place filled with nature, culture and history.

Cheers!

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Karma's moment with Taxi Driver

Each wo/man is an island. I read that in some books by whom I don't remember.

Millions of people walk on this earth. 7 billion people and counting. We all have our own story, don't we? They make us, break us, free us, torture us, enlighten us, refresh us...

Since we are all different, these stories that form us are different too. I feel that when you combine each of these stories they give birth to the so called  life.

It's always been fascinating for me to know the story of each person that I come across. Getting to know that story means stepping out of the comfort zone and actually starting a conversation. If you have read my personal history, you would easily identify me with 'INTROVERT', although I think I have changed quite substantially.

I would like to share one of my story today. Nothing big but definitely something meaningful.

I visited a very close friend of mine a few days ago in Malacca, a state in Malaysia. It's a 4 hour bus ride from where I live. The place where I live is  a place completely remote and basically lifeless during weekends and holidays.

We wanted to go and watch a movie  'The last witch hunter'. We don't own a car neither do we drive. We were waiting at the bus stop for few minutes when a taxi pulled over and gesturing with his finger says 4. Well, taxis in Malacca are a bit very expensive and we are always weary of riding one cause it burns a big hole in our pocket. I told the taxi driver that we wanted to go to Dataran Pahlawan. He said that would cost Rm 6 each. If we took the bus it would cost Rm 4 each. So I told him that it's ok but my friend quickly interjected and said that was a good bargain considering the fact that we had to change the bus twice.

When I got on the taxi, the taxi driver quickly with his heavy breath told me that any people with a good common sense would jump at the opportunity. Considering that I didn't, I think it was meant to piss me off/ mock me. So I told him that I didn't have any common sense. At this, he went quite hot and uneasy. I felt like this was how one progresses into an argument in the grown up world. 

I told him that I was new in the area. He said that it doesn't matter whether I was new or not and I should have known that it was a good logical decisions to accept his proposal.

At this moment I felt like this man is either engulfed with arrogance or  is something more than just a taxi driver as he exhibited a great sense of self-pride. The latter proved to be true.

He went on about his journey into different countries and even went as far as to show his several used passports. I was like why is he going around carrying his passports. His showing us the passport was to prove that whatever he was talking wasn't a bluff.

He was a specialist, I do not exactly know what kind but he was a speicalist in oil and gas industry and is currently employed under Petronas, the only Malaysian company in the Fortune 500 companies.  What I know is that people working in the oil fields make a lot of money so there is no need for one with a full time job in it to be driving a taxi.

He said driving taxi was just a gig he does during his weekends. Well, I know that the decline in oil prices has severely hit many oil and gas companies so could it be ...? Let's not judge, shall we? That's what I told myself.

Here I had this great opportunity to learn from this person in an industry that I am considering to be a part of after graduation. So I just couldn't let it slip. The rest of the time just flew as we exchanged back and forth. He gave me quick responses to all my inquiries.

I infact felt that he slowed his speed a bit.

Rough start but a smooth finish. When we reached the mall, he looked at me as if to really look at who this girl is that he has been talking for the past few minutes. He made some very grown up rumble about being safe and taking care of our belongings.

Although, this encounter may not seem much but it made me smile the whole day. I was glad to have come across him and I hope he did too. Hehe! (' u ')

I feel that I have definitely been able to overcome my shyness of having an actual conversations with someone I do not know.
I feel that I have so many people to meet and so many things to learn.

I hope he realizes that I was able to gain/receive these from our encounter.

Gratitude 12: I am grateful that I came across him and wish him health, fortune and happiness. Gracias' till we meet again.

Cheers for a very late and successful post!

Karma

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Love, Karma

Its been quite sometime since I last posted cause I had been busy with my exams and I am currently participating in a competition which is presently occupying much of my time. The grand prize has lots of cash involved so do pray for me. I had almost completely forgotten about my blog but one of my juniors sent me a fb text requesting me to update. Now well, I thought that pretty much my blog posts were invisible to the world but I am glad that there is at least someone who enjoys it. Please keep on supporting me. <3 Khin <3.

Although I have completely shut off myself in my own tiny world, I managed to finish a book. The book is called  Love, Rosie by Ceclia Ahern. I loved her book P.S I love you and have been following her with some of her other books. I found Love, Rosie quite uninteresting unlike P.S I love you but the book had definitely lot of substance to be taken in parcel especially when a person like myself is in a threshold of entering into a new phase. 

The protagonist of the novel is Rosie Dunne. The book is about how her life evolves from her one mistake when she was eighteen (she becomes pregnant) and how it unfolds one event after another that leaves her broke, divorced, single, lonely and severely depressed. However, with each blow, she strives further and  moves on. When she finally reaches her fifty's she is able to be together with the love of her life, her best friend since age six, Dr. Alex Stewart and is able to achieve her dream of owning and managing her own hotel.

It helped me to put my life in a perspective of how it should be. Although it will never be the way I plan it but I at least have a vision of how I want to be when I reach a particular phase of my life. I have epiphanies once in a while. When I have them, I stand where I am and realize how I always wanted and wished to be standing at the same position years before. Well, it has certainly made me believe that when you long for something and work for it, you will always exactly find having those epiphanies. So dream big, Karma.

Well, you must be thinking the name of this blog posts is similar to that of the book. There is a reason behind it. The book is unique; it doesn't follow the traditional writing style. The book is a compilation of all the emails, letter and electronic messages that are relayed between the protagonist and all the people in her life.

So I thought why not write a message from my present self to my future self.

From Present Karma

To Future Karma

Date: 10/10/2015

I hope you continue to aim moon and stars and never stop, never give up. I hope you travel and meet lots of people. I hope you take every meetings, every incidents, every experience as a learning take away. I hope you savor every moment of life, live the present moment. I hope you give, spread love and hopefully love will be filled in abundance into your life. I hope you live a healthy life and in all this never forget your parents and your family.

I will always love you no matter what cause you are beautiful.

Love,
Karma

I think writing to yourself is always a great way to inspire yourself. Its like a sort of promise to yourself and a self-check mechanism so that you dun linger away from your true self.
Try writing to yourself. One day, when you read it, may be something will stirr inside you.
 

Me with children reading stories together.

Gratitude 11: I am grateful that I had wonderful memories with the children doing what I love, Reading Stories. YAY!

Cheers for another successful post!

Karma

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Karma - What goes around, comes around!

Be good, do good, see good, hear good and good will follow you. Define good!

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10**** ways to make world a better place!

I am facing quite a few problems lately and it's just too overwhelming for me. Someone like me hardly moans when I have problems. I feel like I am a bit emotionally down because of some people I thought were friends but instead turned out to be liars and backstabbers.

I was trying to find a way for myself to cheer up. When I am under emotional stress, I try to look for inspiring videos in YouTube, for instance, videos about kindness, humanity, courage, helping. Although, it may not help you solve your problems but I always find myself feeling better than I felt before.

I also try not to victimize myself. In that way, I won't play the blame game.

I can't advise people to cheer up and talk about all the goodness and happiness in the world when they are going through a rough time. I acknowledge that it takes time to heal and if you feel like crying or you need some time then just do it. However, it should be for only a limited period of time. Take those resting time to reflect and to find peace within yourself. It might take 30 minutes or 4 days or 1 month. Well, it works for me.

Although my topic is about making world a better place, I am not going to share with you any thing about it because you can find tons of those information if you just google it. But I want you to realize that the number 10****  doesn't always have to be 10. If you google about "Making world a better place" , the results will show "7 ways to make the world a better place or 10 ways...". There are not just 7 or 10 ways but millions of ways to help people and make this world a better place. 

Why do I need to make the world a better place? What do I get out of it? Why should I bother about people when I have problems myself? Why? Why? Why?

I believe in the interdependence concept by Dalai Lama. In his talks, he emphasizes on this a lot of times. He says we are all interconnected to each other therefore, any harm or good you do to others will always influence you.

I came across a book called "Five people you meet in heaven " by Mitch Albom and it has been one of my favorite books ever since. The book is centered around a character, Eddie who dies in an accident and finds himself in heaven. All his life time in earth, he had the why? how? when? what? events that had left him sober and unhappy. The heaven reveals his life one fold at a time through the people he met and did not meet in his lifetime.

After reading the book, I realized that we are all in fact deeply related. One of the people Eddie meets is a Blue Man. The man has his own share of sorrows and griefs. One day while driving his car, young Eddie bounces to the road to retrieve his ball. The blue man gets into an accident while trying to swerve his car to prevent hitting Eddie and as a result dies. Eddie never knew that a man had died while trying to save his life. 

Probably, we may have influenced someone's life, positively or negatively  but we are not aware of/about it.

I imagine a magical string being attached to each other and that a magical force determines who we meet in our life, how we come across friends, partners, boss, employees, mentors and how we evolve, live our life and finally rest in peace. My favorite quote from the book :-

" Each affects the other and the other affects the next and the world is full of stories, but the stories are all one" - Five people you meet in heaven

 Another favorite quote of mine.

Gratitude 10: I feel grateful for all the meaningful friends, family, mentors and well wishers I have in my life.

Cheers! Have a good day!

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