What would you say to your pre-university self?

The dynamics of university are very different from high school. In high school or college, there was a defined set of targets and expectations put forward by others, for instance scoring well in school exams, looking for scholarship opportunities, entering a good university etc.

In university, you are on your own. You are responsible for every decision you make and every decision you make might decide who you are and what you do in the very near future. One major difference I noticed lies in the absence of short-term goals like what you would have during high school. You know you have to do something but what? How? I felt lost and perhaps depressed, to a certain extent.

In my second and third year, I started a few projects as well as some business endeavors. It was a tremendously exhausting journey but surprisingly I felt much better than I was in first year. I found a path and a purpose, though it might not be the easiest path to walk on. I might trip or fall a lot but even if I do, I am moving forward.

Some might say university is “useless” because in many cases, what you study will probably have nothing to do with what you do in the future. Personally, I think that university is the perfect ground for you to build connections with amazing people all around the world, and the perfect ground to fail. Yes, fail.

As a university student, you do not have as many responsibilities and expectations than you would have as a working adult but you have more freedom and help. You can afford to fail and start over - an inevitable yet crucial process that builds you up to your eventual success.

University is the perfect ground for you to build connections with amazing people all around the world, and the perfect ground to fail. Yes, fail.

Besides, you have an easy access to a network of professionals literally right at your doorstep! Professors and lecturers are generally always willing to help you if they can with free advice if you go up to them for a chat.

And what was university like for you?

When I first entered university, I actually felt that the language and culture barrier was a factor that hindered social mingling, which was quite surprising to me. I assumed that it would go okay but I found it a bit challenging to mingle with the locals. To be frank, I found the local accent quite hard to understand; I connected better with international students and we knew how each other felt, since we were all trying our best to communicate and learn together.

Due to the language and cultural barriers, I struggled a little in making deeper connections with people, even though I had no problem doing so back in Malaysia, but it did get better eventually.

As mentioned previously I also felt lost as I was questioning what was the point of studying so hard in university. “What’s the next step?” I wondered, especially since I could see the end of university coming soon, and with that, there was a need to “step into society” and do something worthwhile as a career.

Due to the language and cultural barriers, I struggled a little in making deeper connections with people.

In my second and third year, I felt a lot more comfortable. I eventually started some projects and a business of my own, which was quite ironic as I used to hate business. The financial pressure as a result of my business, the amount of workload from both study and work as well as personal health issues made me feel quite down in the dumps at a certain point. Some would say “depressed” although I’m not really sure if the symptoms fit.

However, this was the path I chose and I never regretted it.

Can you elaborate more on the “depression” aspect?

Something that I noticed in Imperial is that depressed people tend to be quite evasive regarding their issues and are reluctant to admit they’re in trouble. In particular, people don’t want others to pity them and that contributes to the idea that depression is ‘taboo’.

The truth is, from what I’ve seen, a lot of Imperial students suffer from it; what matters is how you handle it. People are often more than willing to help you, they do have similar feelings and can give you mental support if you need it. So don’t be afraid to voice out if you need help!

Sometimes, when you do open up to someone else, they might not take it seriously as they don’t see the depth of how affected you are by it due to the mask that you put on daily, and the fact that you seem so ‘normal’. If you don’t feel comfortable talking with friends who may not know how to respond, Imperial health services do offer good professional counseling to those who need it.

I think Malaysian scholars, in particular, have very high expectations of themselves and being at a top university doesn’t really help matters! Here you’re surrounded by top-tier talent from all around the world, so if you fail at anything it hits you really hard.

I’d say to always prepare yourself for failure; things don’t always turn out the way you want them to and that’s alright, you shouldn’t beat yourself up over it. Learn and salvage as much as possible from your mistake. Don’t dwell on it, work on it.

Can you elaborate more on the business that you started? I think it’d be helpful to give readers a glimpse of what is possible for them to accomplish even while they are at university.

I started a social enterprise with my business partner in Malaysia and recruited a few of my friends to join the team. The essence of a social entrepreneurship is building a business that gives back to the community, which I personally feel quite strongly about.

When you have no experience and no capital to do stuff, you need to get them yourself.

It was very rough in the beginning, especially when looking for investments or partnerships, as no one wants to support a company with no proven track record. When you have no experience and no capital to do stuff, you need to get them yourself. You need to build the experience and if it is possible, use that experience to build your capital.

For my entire three years at university, I never traveled outside of London - except Brighton and Malaysia, if that counts! Instead, I spent my time building new skills.

From scratch, I studied graphic design, digital marketing, and business, realms that I never ventured into before and never thought I would prior to my startup project. After a while, I started marketing my skills to international clients via various online platforms and begin building my client base.

During that period, I slept only 5 hours a day and had a ton of caffeine - not really advisable for a uni student! Nevertheless, I survived, and although the project didn’t manage to launch in the end (we put it on hold as we weren’t satisfied with the final quality of the products), we definitely learned a lot from it.

Recently, I have just launched another company with my partner, offering digital services to both local and international clients. We hope that through this company we could eventually build up a core team that we trust as well as sufficient capital so that we could revisit our initial idea in the very near future.

Wow, that sounds great! Nice to hear from you, Wee Rock, and thank you for your time!