Sometimes rich kids who do well in school are stereotyped. One might think they’re good only because they are well taken care of. Only because they have almost all the resources imaginable. Only because they are not preoccupied with something else; their parents almost always do the dirty job for them. One might think that without all these, these kids could not even survive.

I just have to comment on this.

Money does help, but it can only take them so far. Sure, it makes the situation more comfortable, but it does not get the whole job done. Unless they are passionate about what they’re studying, and/or are simply gifted with natural intelligence, they will suck at school.

Also –- and this might sound a bit rude –- it’s not their fault that they were born that way. It’s not their fault that God or some supernatural being assigned them to a parent like that, a house like that, a bank account like that. Alangan namang lumayas sila, at manirahan sa iba.

Siyempre, hindi.

Just like physical appearance and nationality, our parents’ socio-economic status is something that has already been determined for us. But our performance in school -– or in any other place that requires use of brain -– isn’t. With or without natural intelligence, performance in school is something that we work on as we grow up. Sure, some of us may not be as wealthy as the others. But hey, there are lots of poor kids who also excel in school. And there are rich kids who are just plain stupid. Go to Katipunan, and you’d see what they’d rather spend their time and money on.

Of course, not all rich kids are like this. Others know better than this.

Some others.


~~

According to the UP Stat website, graduating Master of Statistics (MoS) students are required to either (A) work on a special statistical problem, as in theses, or (B) take a comprehensive exam. Details of the said requirement are found HERE.

That’s why as early as now, I’m choosing between the two. Plan A sounds good to me, because my undergrad basically requires the conduct of at least two studies per semester. However, I keep on thinking about the benefits of a one-shot exam, because I’ve survived a do-or-die one just last semester.

I’m confused.


PLAN A
Taking Stat 298 (Special Problem)

Advantages:
1. I’ve already gone through and survived (with high honors, ehem ehem) a thesis-driven course, which is BA Comm Research.
2. I can correct potential mistakes while doing the thesis. An exam is a do-or-die thing.
3. Almost all MoS graduates pursued Plan A. Only three (yes, three) went for Plan B.

Disadvantages:
1. The schedule of thesis advisers can be unpredictable.
2. There’s oral defense after thesis writing. Scary.


PLAN B
Taking a written comprehensive exam in Stat 221 (Probability), Stat 222 (Statistical Inference), Stat 223 (Regression), Stat 224 (Experiments) and Stat 250 (Sampling)

Advantages:
1. It’s a one-month thing. I study, I take the exam, and that’s it. Unless I fail, of course.

Disadvantages:
1. It’s hard to study for five subjects at the same time!
2. The exam can only be taken two times. Failure at the second try means permanent expulsion from the MoS program. And I’m not leaving my beloved Stat without a degree, ever! Haha.


I’m still weighing the pros and cons but like I’ve said, Plan A still sounds good to me. Wish me luck.

I cannot let this pass. You 60-something year old man have done something that made me just lose all the respect I had for you. Let me call you Old Cock.



( And I’m firing back at you. . . )

The plan seems to have already been laid out for you. After high school, you enter a Big Four university, or any university that’s relatively known.Then you take and finish a course that’s relatively known. Then get a job, and give back to your family. Find a mate, get married, have children.

Scripted.

What if this isn’t your thing?

Say you gave it your all back in high school, and would like to just take it easy during college. How do you explain that you reside in, say, Caloocan, and would have a hard time commuting to and from UST? How do you say that you cannot atttend UP because you are, well, dumb? (Whoopsie.)

Your ultimate passion is history. Friends and family have seen you track names and dates very accurately. How do you say that Engineering is not for you, because you cannot even add fractions? How do you explain that you didn’t focus on Social Studies only to analyze blood pressure and wipe other people’s asses in the near future, even if this is what everybody seems to be doing?

OK, you already have your bachelor’s degree. But hey, your family’s "afloat." And you would like to study even more. How do you prove that taking a graduate degree is an option, given that in this day and age, vocational, seminar and TESDA-accredited courses are everywhere, and are perceived to be more practical?

Say you are living the single life to the fullest. How do you explain that, at the moment, you are just fine being with yourself?

Or you believe in love more than you believe in diamond rings. Or you don’t want kids; you prefer only to adopt.

How do you do the talking?

And earn some support?

Two answers. You can keep on explaining, whenever you want to, however you want to, but expect little to no support. As your choices may be deviant.

Or, you can just follow your heart, without any disclaimer.

The era of the old, weeping spinster is over. Now, many singles are tough, sexy and sassy. They have total control over their lives, and are doing great at it. They also know and love the word "commitment," but are not a slave to it. They do not hate or envy the committed.

Though certain schools and degree programs are more famous than others, getting ahead in life is not always determined by academic background. You may be a legendary UP summa, but are so idealistic that you can’t anymore exist in the “real world.” You may have pursued that rare, questionnable music degree, but you can so strum the strings of people’s hearts that corporate slaves and white uniformed b*tches now envy you and... and... and wish they followed their true passion too!

What works for others might not work for you.

So just do your own thing.

This is for a man who believed in me. He who may be a bit naughty, but is extremely inspiring. He gave me a chance even when it seemed like I was the most hopeless.

I thank you from the bottom of my heart. I promise I am good enough. I promise your efforts won’t go to waste. I will take advantage of this opportunity you gave me.

I cannot leave first semester behind without recognizing the kindness that three seemingly cheap and ordinary objects showed me.



My pencils. The pencils that have been with me since Day 1. From the instant that I reopened my Basic Algebra book to when I was already practicing Integral Calculus, all to catch up with my BS-holder batchmates. The pencils that helped me arrive at answers to certain mathematical problems in Leithold, Stewart, Mood, Hogg, Strait, Derman and Bean.

That were there, with me, at the Science library, when I thought that I could not survive the said semester and that advanced mathematics could not love me back. I was wrong.

My pencils are much shorter now. They cost less than 10 pesos. But to me, their proud owner, they were never just pencils.

It was probably my love for numbers that brought me and my big forehead to Statistics School. Just after earning my bachelor’s degree, I knew I needed to feed my brain with something more. Something else.

Back in high school, I was in denial. Though I had an OK English, my performance in math-related subjects was just -- as one of my then teachers called it -- beyond stellar. I aced almost every single math exam. I never got a final math grade lower than 95%. My final grade in Statistics, an elective for seniors, was 99%. I did not recognize this strength.

Not until recently.

Despite my obvious passion for computation, the school did not make it easy for me, last June. Coming from an Arts background, I had only Basic Algebra to back my records up. What the school needs from potential statisticians is advanced calculus. Without that, they cannot officially take the very first subject in the statistics curriculum. I could not, though there were other options.

Still I was hurt. I felt like I was not good enough, like the dedication I had for this branch of mathematics was not at all genuine. You see I tend to overthink, being extremely obsessive-compulsive. And it was during that month when I staged yet another mental drama. My 259th, yes I’ve been counting.

But I had to focus. I had to be strong. I had to conquer the fear of settling with a skill which I only kinda love, but do not really, really, really love. There’s a mathematician in me, I knew it. Though I never recognized this before, I knew he had been there all along. And I needed him more than ever. So I had to unleash him, even if it meant having to:

>> visit Science libraries even during free hours

>> decrease hours of procrastination!

>> jump from basic Algebra straight to integral calculus –- all on my own! (now this is what's called crash course)

>> solve hundreds of sample problems, for practice

>> basically do a lot of catching up (my classmates already knew how to integrate; I was still trying to recall synthetic division!)

It was the longest four months of my life, and I almost lost my patience. Really, I thought I would quit, and give in to temptation. I mean, here’s a fresh UP graduate with high honors, there must be lots of jobs for him out there. But I didn’t, for some reason. I sucked it up. I never lost patience. I pushed myself to the limits. I never gave up -- never even on the very last day. I, I. . .

. . . I followed my heart.

Then my skills were finally put to the test -- just one comprehensive exam to test five long months of hard work. I didn’t see it coming. The questions chosen were not what I had been expecting all semester long. Not to mention that my left hand couldn’t stop shaking and I was having other thoughts, like:

>> If I don’t pass this, I will be a total loser next semester (or next month; there won’t be a concept of an academic semester anymore!)

>> If I don’t calm down now, I won’t be able to pass this.

>> Why am I not calming down? Calm down!

>> I have to pass I have to pass!

>> Okay this is Statistics. This is math-related. I don’t flunk anything that has to do with numbers, correct?


Correct, and it was finally made official yesterday. I PASSED. Nothing could have made me happier. That right there was my moment.




~~~

I am taking advantage of this short but much-needed break. I have one whole week to transition from being a kinda-Stat-student to a real deal, officially on-track Statistics student. From a kinda-student, kinda-wanna-work-too to a real deal student. Finally, I can already move up the Statistics ladder without worrying about the coulda-woulda-shoulda’s of being an Arts graduate in a Science-dominated world, because I already got past that stage. I have caught up. Like it or not, I’m now on the same level as any other student taking a graduate degree in Statistics, regardless of age, experience and academic background. I can already officially say that I am not just passionate about mathematics. . .

. . . this young, inexperienced MassCommer is also damn good at it!



( More about my first year as a Master of Statistics student )

“I love girls who want lovelife but will do just fine even without it.”

A status message I found myself posting a week ago. Having read three stupid Facebook posts, and heard from a stupid batchmate searching for love overseas (for, like, a year already), I couldn’t help but Tweet my heart out that day.

Let us not lie, we’ve all dreamed about it. Meeting a handsome guy, exchanging cheesy nothings, dating. All the fancy things he can buy for us, all the majestic places he can take us to, we have all fantasized about.

And are fantasizing, in the case of the singles among us.

Of course, there’s nothing wrong about this. Once in a while, we need to detach from reality, and "have thoughts" about what our hearts -- and groins -- are longing for. As girls and gay guys, we’ll never, ever forget that VHS of Cinderella which our aunts had us watch on reunion day. Or those finale episodes of The Bachelorette where the bachelorette (how redundant), once rejected, finally gets herself together and catches a hottie.

But when we let the fantasy lead our lives, that’s what I have a problem with.

Reality check, not all of us can lure a stereotypical prince charming. Unless we are supermodel hot (no explanation needed here), and/or have a winning personality (hottie may see past the physical), and/or have really great connections (hotties!), and/or are just really really really fortunate (like hottie got drunk or hottie's blind), we cannot have what (and who) we dream of having.

So if you’re an (1) insensitive social outcast, or an (2) overweight single mother of one, or a (3) hideous genius (I counted, that’s three), stop the fantasy and just work with what you’ve currently got!

Good news is, we can redefine happy ever after. We have family and friends, so we can give the love to them instead. We are wise, so we can just focus on our studies or careers first and when the right time comes, that’s when we fall in love. And best of all, we have us. Even before family and friends came along, we already had our fabulous selves to depend on.

Fairytales need not have a man. Sure, he adds sweetness and excitement to the plot but really, we are the ones writing our own stories. Should he come along, then great. But until then...

“...we shall do just fine.”

And hey, isn’t the woman the lead fairytale character, and not the man?





~ ~ ~

I feel strongly about this in part because I had a relationship with someone who my closest friends think is an 8.5 out of 10, but who became a bit domineering. I won’t lie, I held on. But I was hurt. So I just had to quit it, though 8.5 is huge (no pun intended). And I’m beyond happy at the moment.

But more importantly, because I have been around women. Almost all my friends and acquaintances are girls. The classes I’ve attended and the homes I have been to (including our own, of course) are female dominated. And I’ve seen and heard it all.

I'm sad. I'm sad that some of my beautiful ladies burst into tears every night. That they feel unpretty just because of rejection, or being single. That they fall in love with a man (who oftentimes doesn’t really love them back) but lose themselves in the process. I'm sad that they are sad right now.

When, as I always say, they don’t have to be.

A kind of title I so resent. It usually goes on forever, when I write. But now, it's a different story.

I have not blogged in centuries. I've been preparing for something which can possibly improve my status in grad school. It has been four long months (or two, taking away all my bum days, haha) of reading and rereading, of visiting the Science and Statistics libraries, of catching up. Trusty calculators by my side, sheets of scratch paper pounded on by Mongol #2s (and of course my demanding right hand), overworked laptops. Never had I expected anything like this back in June, when I was still fresh from UP Graduation and all that drama. But now, it all comes down to this: just one long exam.

Talking about do or die.

And so people who don't know me and just happened to come across this entry may be wishing me the best of luck right now. I thank you.

Meantime, people who know a little (or just the obvious) about me may be saying right now that I don't need luck. Hey, I also do. Badly!

But to the people who just know me (and every detail about me) very, very well, oh how I love you so and miss you like crazy. I want you to know, though, that the Angelo you once knew seems to have already faded away. Now, I seem to be the dumb blonde, here in grad school. Yet, I've tried to hold on.

And never given up.

Yes, never. Giving up, I believe, is the root cause of all the worries, the Ellen Pineda wrinkles and the I-coulda-woulda-shoulda feelings on Earth. When you give up, you'll never know what's possibly in store for you. So I didn't. Still, I gave it my all. Still, I fought, and fought real hard (anyway, it's for something I'm truly passionate about -- numbers and variables). So that whatever happens, I'll be just fine. Because I'll realize...

I did it anyway.

But that the outcome of it all is already beyond my control.

Though I kept this entry short, hopefully I won't be short of points and bonus points -- four days from now.

Nevertheless, I won't have any regrets. No regrets whatsoever.

To those who think I have not graduated, because I'm still in UP this school year (for a graduate degree, not an undergrad!), this is for you! Haha.

Finally, my undergrad diploma! That document that college students long for and now mine is finally here! This is indeed the ultimate goal. Been waiting for this for more than half a year since university graduation and it finally came! Sweet. And isn't this such a lovely sheet of paper?





I’m so not throwing this away.