2013 has been a pretty interesting year for me.
What I have accomplished throughout the 12 months:
Jan 2013 Part of the Islamic Gift Economy Conference (IGEC) 2013 committee that addresses financial and investment ethicality issues for the Malay Muslim community in Singapore, and we were featured in Berita Harian on 19th Jan.
Got booted out one last time in my swansong IVP football career. Strong favourites to qualify but for countless times, opponents came back in the dying minutes and deservedly eliminated.
Feb - Apr 2013 Study like I have never studied before for the notorious Final Year Exam that all UOL student dreaded. At the same time, achieve a personal success of doing Mendaki tuitions 5 times a week, sacrificing weekends to save up for the most-anticipated event of the year.
May 2013 Finally graduated after 15 years of schooling. Degree with Honors in Accounting & Finance (yay). Realize that accounting is too mundane (thank god for part-time jobs) and I won't survive not sleeping in front of the computer. Finance was more interesting and I did pretty well in those modules. That's it.. I'm set and ready to become an investment banker once I'm back!
June - Aug 2013 Most anticipated event of the year:
Bought a one-way ticket to Guangzhou with 3 good friends and we're off to explore the world. At the very first night, we were chased out of the airport because it wasn't open 24 hours. Lost in Guilin jungle (NO, Bukit Gombak is no little Guilin, it's a little mini-tiny nanoscopic one) with tracks of tiger footprints left behind to find our way, got cheated by Taxi mafia in Hanoi, forced out of bus in the middle of nowhere in Savannakhet at 2am, uncontactable after jumping into a waterfall with my phone in Luang Prabang, slept with tigers in Chiang Mai, fevered after 20-storey-high bungee jump in Pattaya, and were robbed of valuables in Penang that left me with only 30 ringgit to come back to Singapore. So far so good.
Aug - Dec 2013 Job & Soul-searching. Endlessly sending resumes with no success in getting a single interview. Dejected, I went back to do Mendaki tuitions and cleaning projectors from school to school to pass time. Got enlightened after watching The Social Network and started to fervently read up on technopreneurship from TechCrunch and TechinAsia. Registered Kruz as a company, set up Kruz Football e-commerce website, bought a stack of name cards but I have no idea how to raise funds. Cleverly, I registered it as a LLP. Realized that I have a long way to learn entrepreneurial skills and run a proper business and decided to scour for tech start-up jobs opportunities instead. On the last day of 2013, a 24-year-old serial entrepreneur (yes he's of the same age but with more business experience) take me on board as a biz development intern in his spanking new company called ClassWright, a social network for discovering classes.
2014: Exciting Times Ahead
I'm pretty excited of what may come this new year. 3 months make-or-break for ClassWright to achieve substantial traction in the market and hopefully securing a full-time employment and equity shares in the company. Feeling psyched up to be an entrepreneur is one thing, execution and JFDI (just freaking do it!) is one HUGE mantra I have to constantly remind myself.
I'm gonna give this entrepreneurial shot a chance. I'm not going to lie, it's a pretty scary thought how uncertain the future looks. It's going to be a struggle for sure; study loans are coming at me like Typhoon Haiyan and I have to repay my loved ones who have put faith in me thus far. I will have to take up as many tuition jobs if I need to. Just like a 2 months backpacking trip, you only live once. Do what you feel its right.
