Striking The Balance

This is a general description of Nemesis, the Greek Goddess of Justice. But for the sake of this post I will use this maiden of justification to symbolize something else.

Usually in Greek myth, the scales she has would mean justice, the sword would symbolize the power of retribution and her blindfolded eyes would symbolize her ignorance to nothing but the truth.

Here's my version: The blindfolded maiden herself would mean a naive person who doesn't comprehend certain facts of life. The sword would mean power, power to be anything that person wants to be. Lastly the scales, it symbolizes a "balance". Balance which I will explain soon.

Again a post high-school dilemma is at hand. Here's how high-school graduates of my generation would usually think: "Get to a prestigious college/university will give me a bright future." This is an interesting display of stereotyping and utter ignorance, an ignorance so ridiculous it boggles me how would the future of my generation would be like. To quote from my previous Vlog... "80% of Malaysian graduates are JOBLESS." To drag those who are flying like a G6 down from 7th Heaven, no matter how prestigious, famous, well-endowed in facilities, tinseled in countless certificates by a plethora of well-versed associations or foreign universities, no matter how many graduates became successful after graduating, a good college/university is naught more but a catalyst for your future, not a safety net.

LimKokWing, Taylor's, HELP, and the list goes on. Some of the most well-known universities in Malaysia which people would gather upon graduation is a big exaggeration in the world of education. Allow me to sort things out for you; humans have a strong resonance for cash. Whenever they see products which needs stunningly large amount of cash to purchase, their subconscious would automatically recognize that product as a "quality" product. Humans are also sensitive to statistics. Whenever they see other people approve of a product, or that product helped other people to achieve something, they too will acknowledge that product as a "quality" product. A Ferrari, a branch of Carl's Jr. , a Transformers movie, a Gears of War video game, a Louis Vuitton handbag, a UNIQLO shirt, an Alienware laptop, an Ecstasy pill, and lastly; an expensive institute of higher education.

In truth, no matter how expensive your studies cost you, you'd still start at the bottom. It's EXPERIENCE that counts, even if you have the best weapon in a Final Fantasy game, if you character doesn't accumulate enough EXPERIENCE for a Level Up, you'd still get a Game Over from a high level Boss. Take this fact to real life. Let's say if you are an Architecture graduate of LimKokWing University College, you don't suppose that you'd be constructing skyscrapers and Ziggurats right of the mill, am I right? Would you expect your seniors to approve you for a project just because of LimKokWing's internationally recognized certificate, no? let me tell you a fun fact of life; even the most skilled of designers needed experience to improve themselves and for people to vouch for their talents. A graduate is nothing more than a greenhorn to the industry.

For example, my father is a graduate of Business Administration. He is now 51 years of age, with newspaper cuttings for jobs, with a few decades of experience, his maximum pay was RM8000. A 51 year old. Companies are looking for experience, I can prove it to you. Flip through the jobs pages within your local papers, you'll see that they want you to have experience as a prerequisite for the job. They don't give a flying pig where you graduated from. Tetsuya Nomura has been the character designer for Square-Enix since 1997, first starting out in Final Fantasy VII. To this day his artwork is still criticized for having too much zippers, baggy clothes, leather and beads.

Coming back to the figure of Nemesis, the ignorant individual has the power to be all that he can be. But the scales of balance between a decent education and experience must be in par with each other. Going to a RM80,000 course VS. Experience. You do the thinking.

Peace out,

Jonathan