Finally finished my
proposal…I put all my best effort to piece it all into completion. It felt like
a huge burden has been lifted off my back.
Freddy was quite satisfied
with it…he admitted that he saw a marked improvement compared to the last one.
Minus one or two minor corrections, it was ready for submission.
My proposal was very thick
and heavy in contents…it was full of molecular details. Personally I tried to
avoid all the complicated terms, because the general public may find it
confusing and I do not like that situation. But my supervisor insisted that I included
all the details, it was for academic purposes, he claimed.
There are two kinds of people
in this world…the one who explains simple terms in complicated manners to
appear intelligent, and the one who simplifies complex concepts in layman terms
for easier understanding. The former think they are intelligent; the latter think
intelligently. There is a gulf of difference between these two groups. It is
obvious that I prefer the latter, although I must admit I had limited ability to reach that level. Only a select few could achieve that.
I had the rare privilege of
studying both molecular biology and molecular physics (it was called ‘quantum
physics’ in physics). Both are very challenging subjects…they stretched our
mind to the limit. I read news recently that reported a vast number of
professionals are fast becoming an atheist. The more they learned, the more skeptical they were towards the existence of God.
If the purpose of learning is
to edge ourselves closer to God, then they had violently violated that principle.
On a lighter note, Freddy
called to inform that he was picking me up for a simple discussion. He won’t be
around for two days, and this was our last chance to iron out all of our
disagreements regarding my proposal. He appeared to be in a bullish mood…he cleared
all of my confusions with his elaborate explaining, fuelled by his enthusiasm.
He actually rewrote part of
my proposal (in his own words) to clarify and improve it as a whole. I don’t
think any other supervisor would have gone to such extent to help their
students. It was truly my privilege to have him as my supervisor.
Towards the end of our
discussion, he expressed his high hopes for us to perform well during our
presentation. It was around this time that I asked him about the imminent
departure of Dr Lim. He revealed that Dr Lim will be leaving for UM “for some
reasons”. At first glance, it was unclear to me what he meant by that, but then
he went on to explain everything in details.
What started out as an
offhand question, proliferated into a full blown revelation. He exposed in
great length about the inner working of our department, the ‘cog’ in the ‘machine’,
the so-called ‘deadwood’, what the lecturers were talking about the students,
the flaws of the system, the KPI’s, the ‘free-riders’, the grants and teaching
money, the ‘perception’ and ‘pre-conception’, including the ‘power rangers’ who
abused their position. Some of his assertion were so controversial that he made
me promise not to divulge anything to anyone. I will stick to that promise. He
was thoroughly disappointed with all the happenings around him.
Sometimes, we can change
something…but most of the times, we just have to learn to live with it. I am not implying we shouldn't do anything…we should always strive to turn thing for the better. But
after all, we are just a small player in a larger scheme of things. Nothing that
we do will matter much anyway.
Or as the late L of
Death-Note series once said, “No matter how gifted, you alone cannot change the
world”. As a person, we are powerless…but as a group, maybe things will change
for the better. Maybe, one day.
