The Last Battle

pic from Diablo 3

Sharpened my sword.

The day before the scholarship interview, I sent my shoes for polish at Alamanda (RM8). I stayed up that night to study as much as possible the economic terms that might be related to my paper.

The next day, I was awaken by a phone call from Kak Suzie. I was drodgy & couldn't pick up the phone. Got ready. Drove self to the interview center in Kuala Lumpur. It was 10.30am. The letter says 1.30pm. I sat in my car and did more reading until noon.

Examine the battlefield.

Going up the stairs to the waiting room, I met Puan Intan (same department, different division), who told me it was her 3rd time applying for the scholarship. The 2nd person I met was En.Hamizum, whom I had known when he was in KKM and I was the desk-officer. It was his third time too. The 3rd person I met was the guy who-shan't-be-named who took the IELTS exam with me.

At the waiting room, as more and more people came, I realized that almost half of them were from my batch. It was fun coz it was sort of like a batch-reunion and you feel more comfortable being around friends.

I thought the interview turn would be on a first come first serve basis. I was wrong. I was the 1st to register for the evening session but my interview turn was 4pm. Penantian itu satu penyiksaan. Puan Nani (same department, different division) invited me out for lunch since her turn was at 4pm too. Her panels were in room 6 while mine were in room 8. There were 9 rooms.

The place we had lunch at was quite muddy...my newly polished shoes was ruined. After lunch, we stopped at Masjid Bukit Aman and I cleaned my shoes. After praying Zohor, I realized I didn't bring my make-up with me coz I hadn't expected that I would need to reapply (I really thought the interview would be over before Zohor was over). Puan Nani was really kind to offer me her lipstick but I ended up with a really merah-mak-ngah lip while hers, wearing the same thing, was pinky. I guess it's true that cosmetics react differently to different skin/blood type.

Gather the warriors.

It was 3pm when we went back to the centre and the secretariat told me my time was next. It turns out that the panel in that room was speedy in interviewing people. I would be going in the room with a guy named Amir. This was Amir's 5th time. A batch-mate of mine, Faisal, didn't have a partner so he would be going in with us too. Three people being interviewed at the same time. We were the last to be interviewed for that day, which was the last day of HLP season 2012.

The candiddates before us exited the room and one of the two person was a batch-mate of mine. I haven't seen him for almost five years. He lit up when he saw me too and as time was short, he generously poured out as much useful information that he could about his experience being interviewed by the panels (that would soon interview us). After that, he asked me whether I was still in EyeSeaYou and I said yes. He even remembered which division I was and etc. People would usually remember that I'm from EyeSeaYou but not down to which division. I asked him where he was and thought he was at state-posting.

"Tengok, kau tak ingat pun tentang aku," he said, jokingly (I thought he was joking). I grinned, feeling really guilty and in a lower voice he said "Banyak aku ingat tentang kau." I pretended to not hear that coz I thought he was trying to make me feel even more guilty. Besides, what was there for him to remember about me when we were never even in the same 'sidang'. I wished him good luck and Faisal, Amir and I entered the room.

The battle begins.

I got the impression that the panels (a man and a woman) were not interested in my proposal because they only asked about my proposal for 2 minutes. Then, they asked about my family and I told them that that my family would come with me and Mr.H would apply for spouse program. After that, I was asked about meritokrasi, GTP, consultants. Faisal had to defend his paper coz the panels felt it was not suitable to be implemented in Malaysia. That took him almost 10 minutes. After that, he was asked about rukun negara. Amir had to defend his paper too, for about 15 minutes, and then he was asked about tulisan jawi. I was hoping that they would get back to the paper but suddenly, the interview was over.

Sudden death.

I was stunned and without thinking, I dumbly asked what my chances were TO THE PANEL! Gasp! The panel (the guy) laughed and said "Mana boleh kamu pergi oversea nanti tinggalkan suami". I wasn't sure if he was pulling my leg or he was politely indicating that there was no hope for me and there was no spouse program.

Hours and hours of preperation and I was only asked about it for TWO minutes. Sigh.

After the interview, the secretariate told me the results will be out in one month and the successful applicants would be called for briefing in September. She also said that thousands had applied for HLP this year but only about 1000 was called for interview. Out of this 1000, only 400 would be selected.

"Daripada 400 tu, berapa ramai untuk oversea?"
"Oversea 50 je," she said. What??? Only FIFTY???
Sigh.

When she saw I was so shocked and dissapointed, she added, "Tapi kali ni punya HLP kita tak sekat kalau nak pergi mana-mana negara. Sebelum ni kita ada tentukan negara mana tak nak hantar." Thank for trying to lighten the situation but at that point, that information did not cheer me up.

Lets do a rough "Statistik Kebarangkalian". If 7 out of 10 candidates that I met wanted to go oversea, the rought estimation of candidates would be 700 to 1000. Out of 700, perhaps 200 were pHD applicants. They want only 50 overseas applicant.

My Probability for sucess = [1/700 x (50-(85%x50))]/700 = 0.00001429%

Ahaha. That's not even the right math. I know.

The scattered remains.
Mr.H had a completely different experience. He had to defend his proposal the whole interview session.

Kak Suzie said, "Kita dah buat yang terbaik. Yang selebihnya Tuhan tentukan. Itulah namanya rezeki." That's true and I really did feel calm after the battle was over. I had done my best. If the day was to happen all over again, there's nothing that I could have changed.

I firmly believe that any man's finest hour, the greatest fulfillment of all that he holds dear, is that moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle - victorious. -Lombardi-

The morning after.

To those who succeeds in getting the scholarship, please remember that it was not because you were a thousand times better than the rest. It was mostly by chance.