I’m about to get my IT – Bachelors’ diploma. I’m very proud of it because it’s been a hard road. I can proudly say that I’ve paid my own studies. You might wonder: why you had to pay your studies? Is it because your parents were poor and couldn’t afford it? How did you do it? Well, it is nothing like that. My parents aren’t and weren’t poor. Actually, they were paying me a lot more expensive university, the most expensive university on my city. What happened? Me. Yes, they were paying me my education. I had some problems back then.
I was the little girl that just wanted to make proud their parents and I tried to please them and they knew it. They chose the university and they even chose my career. They chose industrial engineering for me. Back then, I was a teenager that I didn’t know what I wanted, I knew that I wanted to be an engineer because I was really good at math. So, I took the easy way, I told them “yes, ok, I’ll study to be an industrial engineer”. It was the easiest choice because everyone was happy with it and the university was beautiful. I’ve always liked the idea of cooking, and the field of the psychology.
Cooking
When I was on High School I took a cooking course. I was the youngest in the course. My peers were married people, and a few university students. I love the experience that I earned. I learned a lot of cooking and I really enjoyed it. But I also discovered that I literally can’t stand for long periods of time, my feet were killing me. It was a course of 560 hours or so, every Saturday. When I took that course on Saturdays, it was the only thing that I did on Saturdays for a long period of time. On Sundays, I used to cook again what l have learned the day before. As you can imagine my social life was nonexistent but I was ok with that because I really enjoyed it. With that cooking course I found out that cooking was a hobby for me and not a career. I still like to cook, from time to time I read a recipe or I watch a video tutorial and I cook it. I used to have a blog about food but I didn't have a good camera. I didn't like the idea of having a blog of food without my own photos, so I didn't continue, maybe later I'll.
The field of psychology.
My mom always told me to forget it because I was going to deal with crazy people and that the jobs were not well paid. I don't agree with those statements but my memory has never been one of my strengths; and I’ve always thought that I need a very good memory skill in that field. So, I never gave it a try. From time to time I read books about the subject.
In the university as an industrial engineer.
I was doing it good on the first semesters. There were some classes that I didn’t like but I was willing to continue in that career. I didn’t make friends there but I still liked the university because the library was so big, I found and read so many books. I spent a lot of time in that library. Sometimes reading books, some other times playing on my laptop. The homework in teams was the worst part because I didn’t really know anybody. On some classes, some of my peers added me to their group because they knew I was going to do my part of the homework. Sometimes I was on a team and I didn’t even know their names. I didn’t know if they were with me in more than one class. It’s not that I couldn’t speak to them, it just that I wasn’t interested on them. I used to feel like they were on a whole different world. They were so different from me. I don’t drink, I don’t smoke and I never have. So, I learned to speak with pronouns. I always avoided to say their names, it was so easy for me. It was so easy for me that even if I knew their names, I didn’t use it. It was something unconscious. When I knew what I was doing, I realized that I didn’t like the university anymore.
My first classes about websites.
I found out a course about websites development. It was about Dreamweaver, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe flash. I read the content of the course and I liked it. I told my parents that I wanted to go. My mom told me that she didn't agree, because that university was too far from my house and I would have to drive. It was also at night, 5pm to 8 pm from Monday to Friday. I told my father the schedule and he said no. He didn't give me a reason, he only said no. I was really upset. I wanted to go, my own brother took some courses there and they supported him. I talked again with my mother and promised to her that I was going to be careful, that I was nervous to go. Back then, I wasn't really good at driving, I used to drive to my university but it was close to my house and I used to park far because I didn't know how to park properly, at least I wasn’t confident about my driving skills. After some time, my mom supported me. She taught me the road and gave some recommendations. I know that my father also accepted it because he paid my course but I never felt his support. Every day that I drove, I couldn't avoid the feeling that I was going against his will. Once again, I was the youngest in the course.
I remember that the teacher asked “Why are you here? What do you expect from this course?” Some answers from my peers were “I’ve to develop a website for my company”, “I’m here because my company is paying me the course”, “I’m starting a company, I want to create my own website” and I was like “I just want to learn because it looks fun”. I really liked it, I did my homework and more. If our homework was to edit an image, I edited at least 2 more images. I read tutorials about Photoshop and I practiced a lot more things that the teacher was teaching us. I couldn't avoid the feeling that I was going agaist my father's will. I didn't go the course because I wanted the diploma, I went because I wanted to learn. When the course ended, I didn't go for my diploma. I was ashamed of it. It sounds ridiculous now, isn't? I mean, I earned the diploma but I never went for it at the university's office. I felt like I didn't need it. I got what I wanted, I learned. I only have the photo on the right as evidence and an email.
Industrial engineering – Part 2
I did not like the classes I was taking. I was already taking the advanced classes. I started to tell my parents each semester that I didn't like it that I wanted to change of university. Something bad happened me, something really bad. I didn't want to go to classes. I never told anybody what happened not even to my parents and I will never do it. I only told them that I didn't want to stay. They are overprotective. If I have arrived to my house at 10-11 pm, it was late, really late and I was in troubles. They were overprotective. I knew that if have told my parents what happened, they would never leave me be “free”. So, I kept it to myself and I got over it alone. I felt so lonely. I like to be alone but not counting with nobody was something different. I thought that my parents would never leave me to change of university. I took the initiative, I took some admissions exams from other universities and I approved the exams. I knew that if I approved or not the exam, it wasn’t the problem. The problem was on how I was going to tell my parents. I didn’t do it, a university do it for me. I gave my phone number and they called to tell me the good news that I passed the exam. But obviously my mom took that call. They went mad, like if I had done something horrible. I told my parents again that I didn’t want to stay at the same university. I still didn’t know what I wanted but I knew that I wasn’t happy there. I couldn’t stay there. I was forced to take an extra class, the class was like talk about my feelings so the teacher could convince me and work the things out to make me stay. The teacher understood that my parents only wanted to make me study that career in specific and he told my mother it wasn’t good for me. After some time, I changed of university with the support of my mother. My father didn’t want to talk to me, he told me that he was going to support my decision, via text message. He didn’t talk to me for a long time. I felt terrible. I was a disappointment for my father. He told me that I wasn’t a disappointment but I knew it. We both knew it but we didn’t say it aloud.
Informatics a new beginning.
I started to study at a new public university. I had to study 3 years and then the university gave me a technician degree. Then, I was going to work for a year on the field. Then, I was going to go back to the university and study for 1 more year and finally was going to get my bachelor’s degree. I did it. My father didn’t approve this career. He is of the old school. He thought that informatics wasn’t a career. He thought that informatics was only Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint and that I was never going find a job as a programmer, not because I was going to be bad at it, It just that in my city there are no jobs for IT. I was on my 3rd term as of technician when my father asked me “when are you going to study?” and I was like… I’m studying right now. He told me that informatics was a secondary career and he told me that one of his coworkers had an IT degree but also an Industrial degree. I didn’t want to ask anything to my father. I studied really hard. For the first time in so much time, I was doing what I liked. I was comfortable with my peers, I had things in common with them. I felt part of them. I was happy. I’m happy about my choice. When I was studying the technician part of my degree, I got a 100% scholarship. My grades were excellent. I’m proud of it because I haven’t had to ask for money for my university.
I started to look a job for my internships, some industries offered me a position but I don’t like the industry. I have always thought that the people in the industry are cold. I think I got lucky. I found a really good company. They were paying me for sending emails. I couldn’t believe it, they were paying me for sending emails. I felt like I wasn’t working. I enjoyed working with a computer. The people in there are very nice. Thank you to this job, I've fulfilled one of my dreams, visiting Silicon Valley! I also went to the Google I/0 event! I really feel that I'm a lucky girl, yes my hard work helped but sometimes the people work hard and don't get what they deserve. Once again, I tried my best. It’s been a hard road but it was worth it. I’ve been working 9 hours per day, finishing my engineering degree (I'm studying 5 hours per day), doing my homework and taking care of my daughter at night. It’s hard but I really enjoy my work, the university sometimes is very tedious but I like the people that surrounds me, I love my daughter and that's why it isn’t hard to wake up early every day(yes, even weekends). I barely sleep, I got used to sleep so little time and I’m used to my tight schedule. These last terms on my university I couldn’t earn my scholarship but I’m able to pay the university with the money that I earn. My parents are now very proud of me. It feels nice and I’m happy about it. After all of this, I’ve learned that I will never do anything for please someone else. I’ll work hard and do what I want so I can be proud of myself. If I’m doing it right and I feel good about myself, everything else is going to be fine.
I know that I've a lot of grammar and spelling errors in this text. :P but as I wrote before, this is a personal blog, maybe I'll read this later and fix it. Maybe.
Etiquetas: actuar, alegría, aprovechar, honestidad
