UTM Convocation

Finally, the day has come. Very much earlier than the medal presentation day, we started our journey as early as 2:00am. Parents, younger sister, girl friend were going to my convocation with me yesterday. Though we were required to report in at 6:45am, we managed to reach Johor at 5:40am to bath and had our breakfast.

As soon as we reached the campus, I quickly prepare myself with my suit and the gown. At around 8:00am, all the graduates queued and walked in the hall. Our parents went in earlier than us. As I was walking in, I saw my parents smiled at me.

Our vice chancellor was punctual. The ceremony started with National song and a speech by vice chancellor. There are more than a thousand graduates who were going to receive their scroll that morning. I was the 616th to receive my scroll.

Our faculty (Faculty of Computer Science) was the one with the most first class degrees. I was one of them. I waited impatiently until finally it's our faculty's turn. We queued on the side of the stage. Walked up the stage one by one and receive the scroll from vice chancellor when our names were called. After a number of names from our faculty had been announced, there was a technical problem. They stopped announcing names. How sad! This made my convocation experience an unpleasant one.

It finally finished at 11:30am. It ended with our university song.

I spent hours taking photos with my coursemates and my family. The photo session with my coursemates made me feel great.

We travelled back to Klang at 3:30pm, after I returned my gown and took my certificate. Another tiring yet memorable day.

Medal Presentation

Friday has been a very tiring day for me. I woke up at 3:30am to prepare myself to meet my coursemates at 4:30am. We chatted all the way from Klang to Skudai since we didn't meet each other for a number of weeks already. It's always nice to update each other about our current life.

We reached our campus (UTM) at 8:35am for convocation rehearsal which is supposed to start at 8:30am. They told us about some rules for the real convocation. It ended with a rehearsal by a number of students who volunteered themselves.

After the rehearsal, we walked over to the robe collection booth. I found myself queuing for almost an hour, before I was able to push myself out of the crowd. Next, we went over to Lucky Town, our favourite lunching restaurant during our campus life, to have our lunch.

The medal presentation event started at around 4:00pm. The event was like a Chinese students' gathering where I was able to meet most of my Chinese coursemates. It started with a speech by our Dean. From the event, I realised that there are so many of coursemates that did so well in their result, after 4 years studying together. There were even some who got 3.96. Our CPAs are shown on the projector display when the medals were presented to us.

As soon as each of us had gotten our medals, we spent the rest of the time taking photos in the hall. That was the time we got to chat with those long-time-no-see friends. A light meal is followed after that.

We began to travel back to Klang at around 6:30pm. It was a great day.

My Convocation is Coming

It's my turn for convocation this coming weekend. Had been preparing for it in the past weeks. There are so many documents that has to be filled and mailed to them. It's sad that I still have to send those document in post office despite the technologies we currently have.

If you do not know, I've spent 4 years in Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) for a bachelor degree of science (Computer Science). The university is located at Skudai, Johor, 4 hours or 360km away from my home, 30 minutes away from Singapore.

This coming Friday (22.08.2005), there will be a medal presentation event. Five of us (YiYang, CheeKuan, HooiNee, Lek and I) have planned to car-pool there. SweeHong, our good 'brother', will not be with us because he will be driving his parents there. Last Saturday, we came out to meet at SS2, just to discuss this matter. It will be a one-day trip.

Next event, our convocation, would be on Monday (29.08.2005). We all will travel there separately to drive our own parents there. I plan to drive there early in the morning. Some of them will be driving there a day earlier. On that day, we have to register ourselves at 6:45am. I think you can guess how early I will have to start my journey from Klang. The event will end at around 12:30pm. We shall have a photo session around the campus till evening, before travelling back. Hopefully all my coursemates will be there, taking pictures with me.

I really hope my friends in Klang would be able to be with me, but I know it's hard. It's on a working Monday. Will update again soon.

University of Malaya Convocation 2005

Yesterday was the last day of University of Malaya (UM) convocation. It was also my girlfriend’s convocation day. Woke up early in the morning to have our breakfast at Berkley Corner. We were early that day, to reach the UM at 7:15am.

After she got herself ready, she went in to the hall with her parents. Spent hours wandering around with her sister when she was in the hall. Luckily the stalls were many enough to fill up my waiting time. They were selling flowers, food and cloths. Bought nothing but some food to feed my stomach.

We were fortunate to be able to take pictures without haze that had hit whole Klang Valley heavily earlier few days. If you are not aware of that, the average Air Pollution Index (API) of Klang Valley has increased to more than 300 in the past few days due to forest burning in Indonesia. The weather was fine yesterday, slightly cloudy, made the photo taking session not too hot. She has lots from friends coming from Klang to attend and her convocation. I was the cameraman, taking hundred of photos.

Besides her friend, I saw a number of my friend as well. One of my colleague and also a number of my secondary friends were also there having their convocation or celebrating for their friends.

Everything was great until it rained heavily at around 1:30pm. We went to Midvalley to have our lunch after that. Did I mention about her course? She graduated with a first class degree in Bachelor of Science, majoring in Chemistry.

Pikom PC Fair 2005 II

Though I went to this PC fair twice, I didn't spend a single cent to buy anything. Both visits took approximately an hour each. Maybe not in the mood to buy computer hardware now. Normally, I would at least spend a few hundreds of ringgit in this kind of fair. Maybe because I'm currently spending on my own little salary. Have to think twice before buying anything.

As opposed to the old Pikom PC fair tradition, the location of this fair has been changed to Kuala Lumpur Convention Center, not the old Putra World Trade Center (PWTC) anymore. The environment is better, with everything of the building is still new. The fair took 5 halls of the center, but the first hall (a ballroom) is not connected to the other four. I noticed that if we proceeded to the second hall which is quite far from the first, we are not allowed to go back to the first hall unless we walk a big round for it. Bad arrangement!

Most of the booths were almost same as what can be seen in the past years. Nothing much... Anyone has visited this fair? What's your opinion of this fair?