An Engineer who doesn't want to become an Engineer

There was this one evening my mum called me on my mobile.


"Seems like you little brother's SPM result does not qualify him for the engineering degree course. What should we do?"


My immediate reply was:


"Kill him".





Luckily tak jadi macam sin-chan.

In today's world, it seems like a common thing that a proud parent will always wanted their child to study and eventually ended up working in a technology-related field. Anything differs, is considered as failure.



As a freshman in university, it is common that engineering students seems to be able to attract more attention compared to those from business or admin sector. Tell the girls you are going for the calculus class, you will ended up with dates. Tell them you are going for business ethnic class, prepare for a gay-boy group discussion instead.


Well what i say is in general and it is based on my experience. It doesn't mean it is the same perception for everyone, but mostly, yes. I once changed my course from IT into Electrical Engineering course and ended up every ex-coursemate labelled me as "traitors" and "Show off" for being carrying a "Electromechanical devices" books instead of "C Programming".

But none of them knew how heartbreaking i was when i got my first ever "0" (zero) marks in my first ever calculus quiz. (The lecturer told me i got the right answer by using the wrong method, that is really bullshit man).

Ok back to the topic.

Well now that i am an engineer myself, the real thing isn't "taste" anywhere like the thing that we "think" it should be. In the early 80s' and 90s' engineers are making handsome sum of money. Back to reality, the one who stay in big bungalows and driving big fat German cars are those people who are in business sector, insurance, property market, to name a few.

So, the main question is, if the real motive of the parents is that they wanted their kid to get a steady job and earning a handsome salary in their job, why it has to be engineering? It is not end of the world when my brother failed to get into engineering course. It will only be disaster if my brother tell me that he has no direction in his career path.

If he want to become an engineer, let him be!

If he want to become a singer, don't worry!

If he want to become a teacher, go ahead!

If he want to become a gigolo, of course cannot lah!

Too often at times, the engineers who spent lots of effort and time into a certain project was not rewarded as they should be getting. Take an example, everyone wants a piece of Steve Jobs autobiography, mourned on the losses of the genius, without realizing that they forgotten about one of his main right hand man - the engineer, Steve Wozniak. It is the people who have done the presentation receive the fame, but the one behind the scene remained as mystery.

You look at KLCC, you think about Petronas but not Cesar Pelli, the architect.

When you look at your phone, you remembered maxis, celcom or digi, but not Alexandre-G. the Bell.

When you look at Air Asia, you remembered Tony Fernandes, but not the Wright brothers.

To conclude, in the ideal world, when you are able to wire up a microwave oven all by yourself does not actually guarantee success on your behalf. Even if you do not have a university degree, it is not going to be the "Oh my Motherf*&^king god! I am gonna get so screwed!"

Some people even said, it is even worst if you became a writer. Because writers write nonsense in their free time and got peanuts or even nothing in return. But what if the writer himself is the engineer, a part time property negotiator, and a part time writer?

I will leave it for you to judge.

Last but not least, before a friend of mine passed away he told me this.

"Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.”

Rest in peace, my friend. May god always be with you.