now put it this way

As the issue of career development becomes more imminent I cannot help but to think that I am not ready for the future yet. When it comes to contemplating about the future a wide array of sentiments start jumping in. 17 yeas of education in hk gave me nothing but instinctual acquiescence towards authorities. After all these years in a Western cultural setting I still find it hard to remove that disgraceful, obsequious smirk on my face when I talk to teachers and bosses; I still find it hard not to stammer when I talk to someone older than me. I used to, and to a certain extent still do, regard schools as institutions whose job is to lay out my career path so that I can tread on it at ease - e.g. unrolling red carpet in front of me before I take my first triumphal step towards reality.

But alas, reality is a colossal machine that functions in incomprehensible ways. Sometimes it works in one's favour but sometimes it puts one in total misery... no, that is actually an oversimplification - reality functions in such impartial and incalculable ways that it is no longer possible to determine whether an outcome is favourable or not. Every outcome is so multi-faceted that one conceives widely different connotations from it, depends on where one stands. To many this is genuinely comforting - at least one could choose to see aupice in miseries and disregard disasters that ensues. But this is an over-simplification too. The fact that one could turn one's head away from negative consequences of an outcome from reality does not mean that they would cede their places to good tidings. They haunt one like ghosts and would eventually surface as greater tragedies - worse still, the causes of these tragedies are long buried under thousands of other events and it is impossible to trace their paths before they strike. To live one's life is an experience no less frightful than walking through a giant maze. One is free to make choices, without being able to know what is waiting ahead along that dark, winding corridor. But once a choice is made at the cross road there is no way back - even if one realizes that some sort of karma monsters are waiting to devour one's flesh.

Ecce homo! This is as much free will as we get.

One cannot be more mistaken than to think that education equips one to slay karma monsters. At the sight of an unsightly karma knowledge cowers and retreats to the darkest corner of one's head. Instincts, whose sword has been blunted after yielding to authorities for years, engage but fall victim of karma before they know what they are dealing with.

This is why education and school are my lifetime agony (as opposed to a string of cute petty little events that one would cease talking about as soon as one starts a career) - 17-odd years of Chinese education scarred me for life. At these institutions I learnt how to yield, submit and forget about my past and future . I soon realize that I am no better than being blind-folded when i stand at crossroads - which, I thought, hardly matters anyway because the corridor is too dark to see. But then someone whispered in my ear, 'you can study the bloodstain of your unfortunate predecessors to get a clue of what lies ahead of you.'

I no longer let anyone judge me as a person and I no longer strive to be recognized by a school - my pre-17 year-old educaton was the outcome of a massive social fraud. Let my academic achievements become anecdotal tales! At such time of turbulence and uncertainty perhaps it is best for me to sit there and wait - reality would unroll itself in front of me in ecstasy.