As
a child and a teenager, I went through numerous tough times like many people. Moving
to a country with a totally different culture to the ones that I had known had
led me to witness the most difficult times of my life. The only advantage I had
in the beginning was probably knowing the language even though later on I found
out that, that didn’t matter much because no matter what a part of my will
always be a stranger to this beautiful city covered in a blanket of clouds.
And this is not the
point.
I
was put into a special learning class in my secondary school. It was for kids
with learning difficulties. Other than my strange ADHD that leans more towards ADD,
I didn’t have any problems; I was there because I wasn’t born in this country. That
and everything else around me had put me off school and the environment in
general. But my dad had reasons on why we had to stay here and his reasons were
too good to go against. As I grew older he always told me to aim high because
even if I didn’t reach it, half of it would’ve been more than enough for me. Being
so young and naïve, I obviously saw things through my pink glasses, words going
through my ears and yet they had no meaning.
When
I was around 13 or 14 I watched a movie called “A Beautiful Mind” I’m sure many
people know that it’s about the great mathematician John Nash. I ended up
reading his autobiography. I’m not sure why but Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) had caught my maybe a little too
much. I asked my dad about the institution and I found out that it was one of
the best universities in the world.
So
I aimed high, higher than I could’ve imagined. I wrote my aim on my small
whiteboard just to remind me at all times, like the coordinates of a star. I
didn’t get to go to M.I.T. for my undergraduate maybe, but I ended up being a
student at one of UK’s top 5 universities. Despite living so many horrid
moments personally and academically and almost giving up on everything a few
times, remembering what I had written on my wall had never failed to ignite the
motivation that had gone out several times.
Now
that I’m in my final year of university and still going through some rough
patches, I was reminded by the writings on the wall. I had aimed high and I suffered…a
lot, but I survived, what’s going to stop me this time?
My
dad was right, even though I may have not reached the actual goal itself; I had
set my target so high that even landing on where I am now is more than the
halfway line.
