Starting a New Life Abroad

When I started my undergrad course (we’re talking about a pre-historic era here), I was one of those ‘lucky’ freshmen who were entitled of experiencing a temporary hell on earth for two days (also known as induction days) created by the seniors, endorsed by the chamber of deans.

My fellow new students and I were forced to stretch out our patience almost to the max in order to do various tasks: arriving at the university at 5am on the dot, wearing silly accessories, addressing the seniors Maharajas and Maharanis, performing stupid greeting, embarassing oneself in public, collecting signatures, being yelled at the face for making nonexistent mistakes, etc.

All freshmen’s induction programmes were meant to be tiring, annoying, ridiculous and nerve-wrecking. Even back then, we all had heard about the sort of sadistic treatments given to the freshmen by the seniors, which at some cases had caused fatality.
I was rather fortunate, in some way.

The tasks and the regimens at the school department that I went to were not famous to be physically sadistic. I did do sets of squats, push-ups and stair runs, but the rest of the assignments involved mind games. The seniors enjoyed torturing the freshmen’s innocent mental states (… and two years later I was among the happy seniors! *LOL*).

For one of the induction sessions, the freshmen were gathered in a lecture room. We were given a piece of paper and a pencil, to write down 10 ways to use of a brick within a minute.

Try to think about ten ways of using one single brick, with scary and heartless seniors shouting and screaming at the background.

I think I came out with only 5:

- a doorstop

- a book end

- a tire stop

- an emergency pestle

- as something to throw at a burglar/thief

When the time was up, a senior briefly read my answers and said, "That’s it? You’re not really creative, are you?"
I just held my head lower.

Another senior who was standing in front of the room, wrote down on the blackboard 15 ways to utilise of a brick (oh yes, we still used a blackboard back then).

Every single answer that he wrote made sense and there was no silly stuff. Sure, he might’ve discussed the answers with his friends and consulted a Buku Pintar or summat (doh!) prior to the session, but hey… back then, I was going, "Why didn’t I think of that?"

By the way, the burglar repellent was not amongst the options.

Not only am I not creative, but I’ve also got problems with my long-term memory.
I couldn’t recall the complete list that the senior had jotted down. Yet there was one meaningful thing got stored in my lame memory from what I experienced that day.

The session was ended by one of the seniors saying,
"You have to be able to think outside the box. Be creative. Free yourselves from the traditional constraints and restrictions.
Time does not wait for you if you can’t keep up with the progress."
He also said something about a psychologist-to-be will be required to see the big picture as well as the details to choose the appropriate treatments for a client blah blah blah, but by then I was already deep in my thoughts picturing a tiny me looking bewilderedly at and around a huge box.

Honestly, I really did imagine that.

Years had passed since that nighmarish induction programme but whenever I get stuck at making decisions and/or creating a solution, the picture of me and my former classmates in the lecture room learning to be creative in a supressive condition always reanimate in my lazy grey cells. Mind you, I’ve not become a creative master, dear gods, no. I’m still often happy to take things as they are.
But I can retrieve an open mind when I need it. Of course it doesn’t sound original, but we all have to contend with what we’ve got, don’t we?