Thankful for Singapore Education System.

I was born in a small town in Indonesia but spent more than a decade living and growing up in another small country beside it, Singapore. Living in a foreign country by myself definitely help to shape my life and characters as a better person.

I moved to Singapore when I was 14, with my parents goal in providing me better education and future. The first year was really tough as my English was really bad and having to live in a foreign country for the first time by yourself wasn’t an easy task. I was having a tough time figuring out everything by myself, from laundry, paying bills, communicating with everyone else, adjusting to environment and taking care of myself. Finding school was probably the toughest challenge when moving to Singapore. Rejection from schools are common, and to make things worse, I did pretty badly for the general entry exam too. Everything seemed so hopeless, getting accepted by school seems like an impossible task. That was the year that I actually saw my Mom cried because of her disappointment in me. I felt so useless and heartbreaking that I made a promise to myself that if any school would ever accepted me I would try my hardest to study really hard.

Miracle do happened, I was accepted and enrolled to a Govt-aid school in Woodlands, Christ Church Secondary School. I was so happy yet so nervous of the uncertainty stepping into an unfamiliar territory. School started pretty early, 7:15. I woke up at 5am every morning, it was really an adjustment as I never had to wake up so early before. The first thing I noticed about Singapore schools was that everything is so proper and huge. We had a really huge canteen that could cater up to 2000 or more students. There were so many food stalls too! Over 10 food stalls choices to choose from everyday!

First year was a huge adjustment, I had to communicate with everyone with my broken English. Everyone else was really friendly and welcoming though. Singapore students were much more behaved than Indonesians. They were generally more polite and well brought up. I made friends from multiple races; Indians, Malays, Chinese, Eurasians. I spent most of my first year mugging and studying really hard for exams, I remember I really tried to memorize every single word in the textbook for my exams and tests. I had a really big determination that I was going to try my hardest in getting the best possible result I could get. I had really low expectation for myself as I was never a good student back in Indonesia, I was simply just trying to study really hard as if my life depends on it. The first term result was out, and I received ranked 3 in my class. It was really surprised by it, it was the first time in my life that I actually did well academically. That first term result really gave me confidence boost and pushed me to study even harder, I spent more time in studying and was really obsessed with getting excellent results. I ranked better everytime, from 3rd to 2nd, before getting first ranked in my cohort! Not just class but I topped the entire cohort in my first year. I was really surprised at myself but I realized that it wasn’t really because I was smarter than anyone else, rather it was because I studied really hard and spent almost all my time just mugging and memorizing everything that was on the textbooks. This was an important life lesson for me as I begin to understand if we worked hard in life, we would be able to achieve amazing results.

After my first year, I started taking my life seriously more than ever. I started having big dream, big goal, and often wondering what’s my future would be. Second year was pretty easy for me as I had pretty much adjusted to Singapore’s culture and lifestyle. I started enjoying studying and life in Singapore. There was this infamous term called “kiasu-ism” in Singapore, that reflects Singaporeans’ habits in wanting to win in everything or afraid of losing, I was pretty much adapted that culture into my daily lifestyle. That made me adapted and really enjoyed my years in Singapore.

Skipped to final year (3rd year) of my Secondary school, everyone was so stressing up about upcoming GCE ‘O’ Level Examination. Differs from my first year, I now had really high expectation from myself. I was aiming for straight A1s and a B for my English (as my English was still pretty bad and broken). I was aiming to enter Ivy-league Junior College too, and eventually NUS (Singapore’s best University and probably number one in SEA or top 3 in Asia).

‘O’ Level Examination result day was pretty rough though, I was short from my goal and expectation. I did receive all As, but I was getting multiple A2s instead of A1s. This was a big deal as it could mean the difference between getting to top tier JCs and good JCs. As for my English I received a C6, which was a bare minimum to enter JC. Everything didn’t go as expected, don’t get me wrong it was still a pretty good result but the past 3 years academic successes had set everyone’s expectation of me pretty high and I failed to meet those high expectation.

Failing short from my perfect score however, turned into a blessing in disguise. I was enrolled into Jurong Junior College, which was never in my JC list before. But I had my best 2 years of my life in that JC. Entering my fourth year in Singapore, I had now different mindset. I was no longer crazily obsessed with my academic result, I was still aiming to do really well of course, but I just had different mentality this time that I should slow down and start appreciating everything around me. This new mindset helped me to discover what Singapore has to offer other than good academic structure.

Class size in JC was so much smaller than Secondary School (20ish instead of 40 students per class). Learning experience was really different too, as now we have lecture session where all the classes come together to learn together in a big theatre lecture hall. It was in JC that students no longer see me as a foreign student, but rather another student in JC. I felt more welcoming and easier to make close friends in JC.

I joined Basketball Club, and made some of my lifetime friends from this. Basketball Club was pretty tough, as we had to go through not just physically but mentally challenging training. Yelling, scolding, and punishments were common. I was really blessed as I met some of the most awesome friends from this Club, that I still considered as my lifetime friends until today. They were pretty silly and crazy but they were some of the friends that I could trust and depend on.

Unlike my first three years in Secondary school, I was really active in JC. I joined a lot of activities, met a lot of friends, went for school trips and I was basically in school everyday. Yes, even on Sunday for basketball practice. I went to school in the morning and pretty much only go reach home at 9–10pm every night just to sleep. I really enjoyed and appreciated every moment I had in my JC years. At that moment I realized that I was having the best time of my life, and I was right.

In Singapore, there was this National Service that all males had to go through upon turning 18. They had to serve in compulsory Military Service for 2 years. I didn’t have to as I wasn’t citizen, but all of my close friends had to serve 2 years in military. As for me, I went straight to University after graduating from JC.

I somehow made it to my dream University, National University of Singapore. Although I didn’t get to study the major that I wanted, I did get enrolled into my second choice (Economics). University years were pretty dull though, as everything moved so fast and all of my close friends were in military instead of University. I eventually gotten my degree after three long boring years. My parents though, was really proud of me as I went from being a mischief boy to someone who take life really seriously.

This concludes my first 8 years of education in Singapore, I really forever grateful for this experience as I really learnt and grew a lot as an individual.

Simple things such as work really hard for things you want and have determination. Enjoy life and try to appreciate little things in life. Be polite, be responsible, be nice to others. Setbacks will happen in life, it is how we are dealing with it and move on from disappointments to become better person. Have high expectation and standard but don’t beat yourself up just because you failed to achieve it. It is okay to fail short, it is okay to have high expectation and not meet them as long as you have tried your best.

Thank you so much Singapore. I will always see half Singapore in myself.