As I was looking at my graduation gown, I can't help but to be overcome with sadness and regret. I sighed that time creeps away without you realising it. The terrible mistake is that I didn't make full use of the time and opportunities in NUS. It could have been so much more. I could have achieved more and did much more and had an enriching experience, my kind of way. And so it's lost, time can never come back. But what is lost? I asked myself. Was i just being emotional and so I long for the past or was it really so that I did not maximise the potentials and to realise it? I sat and I think. If I had wasted my time for the past three years, what do i mean by that? And so how can i not waste my remaining years?

I chose the hard way for the remaining last year to do a minor in china studies. I thought that the seek of knowledge is a meaningful way to spend time in NUS. And then i realise that doing 6 modules make me so tired that i can't think of anything else. Keeping myself busy did not fill that void i felt in my heart and the end of the day. Something is still missing. For the first two years of NUS, I try to have a social life with the mafias. They were one bunch of fun people to hang out with. I thought it could be the key to happiness, somehow, for I had always been a anti-social guy before NS days. I had to really admit that I was really AS(anti-social). Social outings was something quite new to me. I tried and don't really feel comfortable at the end of the day. Still, something is missing. But then after i started teaching, I started to really appreciate myself and have fun with these guys. I just realise that I can be sociable, but it takes a long time for me to get use to the people. I need to take a long time to warm up to crowds, groups of people. This kind of fun, somehow, beats the hours of satisfaction I will derive from reading chinese journal articles in the Chinese library. Sure, I do enjoy reading the "General History of China", or even "Zhuangzhi" or "Analects". Books are still books, they are dregs of the dead people. They can't talk or interact with you. At some point of time, its the social context you are in that makes you who you are. Your self-worth, your purpose in life, who you are and what you do is still bounded by the society. Its the people around you and how you interact with them that is more important.

So as i am doing my thinking, i decide to reassess my priorities in life, to make sure that I shall not waste my time anymore from this point onwards. My deepest regret in NUS, would perhaps be that my social circle was increasing at a snail's pace and hardly wide at all. But then, i had made a few really really great friends. Perhaps, I also felt that it was a waste that I had not gone for any SEP, to China, where I could have see for myself the wonderful China. I had the chance to know friends of my age group in China and to interact with them, to hear their stories and to share the passion of its history and culture.

So what are my priorities in life? I shall list them in order, with the highest importance on the top, so that i shall remember them by heart, and not to let time waste away again without achieving wat I had wanted to.

1)Social relationships
2) Personal interests
3) Career achievments