college
A few days ago, a dear friend of mine came into London to spend sometime with me on my birthday weekend. Over dinner, we were exchanging winter travel plans and she started sharing some of her dramatic encounters during her exchange programme thus far.
It revolved around how people are too quickly to judge your actions and question your decisions, without really understanding your situation.
It stemmed from the fact that traveling is seen as a luxury that people, like us, who come from humble backgrounds, don't deserve to enjoy. Where we come from, the older generation - sometimes even the youths too, believe that traveling and visiting new places is not considered as a part of learning or education. More often than not, it's being frowned upon and perceived as part of a lavish lifestyle, one we should not adopt because our families aren't wealthy.
Money has always been a very touchy subject in my family. A term you refrain from using, as if it were Voldermort. I'm lucky enough to have the money to travel without having to work. That being said, the money is not more than sufficient. In fact, it is less.
So here's how i've been rationing my allowance to have more money for travel:
1. Reduce Shopping Expenditure
Telling myself every item of clothing I buy can probably fund 1 night stay in a hostel.
Plus having a really small cupboard in Halls means not having sufficient wardrobe space. It also means I have to put in more creative brain juice refrain from repeating outfits. Seems like a win-win situation!
I use to shop a lot. $100 each time I checked out my cart - say once every 2 months, sometimes once a month. After living alone in Paris, I stopped shopping excessively. Partly because I could hardly find clothes at "thailand prices" and I cannot justify buying luxury goods.
People constantly tell me Paris and London have amazing places for shopping because things are so cheap. I do not agree.
2. Not Eating Out
Unfortunately, I don't have the luxury of meal plans in my hall - meal plans that my counterparts in america get, that they don't have to pay for, yes i am jealous.
But that's okay. There is always a way around.
a) Sandwiches are really cheap when you make them yourself.
b) Cooking in a group means you get to split the grocery cost - thats a real good plus point.
Of course you can let yourself have a good meal say once every month or something, but there are always cheaper places to go to. All those frequent Café Hoppers - THERE IS YOUR PLANE TICKET TO ANOTHER COUNTRY.
Alternatively, cooking = learning a new skill and you'll never want to pay 4pounds for a sandwich from the school canteen that you can make yourself (Lesson learned after buying 3 not very nice sandwiches).
p.s. I use to be all obsessed over Starbucks and coffee, but now, no. 3 Starbucks drink = 1 night of hostel rental.
Also, packing lunch when going for day trips (see point 4) helps to save a lot more money!
3. Eating Less
No snacking, unless biscuits are on sale/under a pound.
Eat less but please don't starve yourself.
I don't mean go on a diet, or eat less than required to save money, but eating less snacks, and eating proper meals does save a lot. From the looks of it, I'm spending a lot on snacks. If you're like me, and prefer Tyrells / Kettle / any other more expensive brand of snacks, then this point is especially important.
I realise, 75p Sainsbury Brand Digestive Biscuits are so much cheaper and more worth it than a £2 bag of chips.
4. Taking Day Trips
This probably works only if you're in a bigger country with multiple intercity train lines. For a small country like Singapore, it would be hard to take day trips anywhere other than Johor Bahru in Malaysia.
But, after living in the European Continent, I realised taking Day Trips is an amazing way to travel, explore different cites, and save on the lodging fees. Lodging in most UK cities cost minimum about £15-20 a night, as a college student I don't have the ability to pay for that. So, taking day trips as opposed to weekend trips is a much better alternative.
Alternatively, you can always stayover/crash at a friend's place, or try couchsurfing. Since I have no experience in that (yet), I can't give any tips.
5. Recording EVERYTHING I purchase
This is so much harder for me than I could have ever imagined.
Honestly. I have never been good with recording my finances.
I tried keeping a log of what I spent on whilst in Paris, that sort of failed. After 2 months, I stopped recording down, probably because I was having an internship allowance.
But, there isn't any more inflow of cash whilst in London. And with that in mind, I must say, thus far I'm doing good. After 1 month in London, I think I'm within my budget - this includes having to buy things like pots, pillows, shoe rack, rail cards, and other settling in stuff.
Plus, recording everything diligently (as diligently as I can - 'A' for trying) shows you how much money is spent, and where. Using an excel sheet allows me to see how much I spend on groceries, travel, and other miscellaneous stuff.
I learnt a tip from a guy friend of mine. He told me that he recorded everything on his phone, and then transferred it all to an excel sheet maybe once a week. After adopting his method, it was a lot easier to keep a log of the outflow of cash from my pocket.
Prior to using his method, I would open my excel sheet everyday and attempt to recall what i've spent. But every time I turned on the computer, I open safari and that's it.
So, Thank You Daryl. I'm sure my parents would be proud of my new found financial recording ability.
People tend to restrict themselves because they don't see a possibility in certain things happening. Most people don't see a possibility in traveling because they believe it is expensive.
Recently, I've come to realise that money should NOT be a restriction. There is always a way to save up, to work, and to fight for your dreams - be it travel, art, photography. Mine is to travel. Money (or the lack of) should not be the determining factor.
I'm not going to make my parents pay for my traveling expenses, so that's what I've been doing and trying to do to ration my budget so as to be able to travel more during the breaks.
Let me know if you have more tips!
X
Pictures from Barcelona.
"You don't have to be rich to travel."I saw this quote on Pinterest the other day, and I believe its true. You don't have to spend excessively to travel. In fact I've been always taught to live within my means.
So here's how i've been rationing my allowance to have more money for travel:
1. Reduce Shopping Expenditure
Telling myself every item of clothing I buy can probably fund 1 night stay in a hostel.
Plus having a really small cupboard in Halls means not having sufficient wardrobe space. It also means I have to put in more creative brain juice refrain from repeating outfits. Seems like a win-win situation!
I use to shop a lot. $100 each time I checked out my cart - say once every 2 months, sometimes once a month. After living alone in Paris, I stopped shopping excessively. Partly because I could hardly find clothes at "thailand prices" and I cannot justify buying luxury goods.
People constantly tell me Paris and London have amazing places for shopping because things are so cheap. I do not agree.
A £50 pound bag is not cheap. It probably used to be £200. That does NOT justify the purchase - something I realised last summer.
By not buying that bag, that wallet, that pair of discounted shoes, you actually end up with A LOT more money to travel.
One way of going about with self constrain is, if you second guess the purchase, don't buy it. If the thought "SHOULD I get this?" don't get it. "What if I regret?" always follows closely after, but unless you absolutely need it (for example, gloves for winter when you don't have any), you will NOT regret.
Unfortunately, I don't have the luxury of meal plans in my hall - meal plans that my counterparts in america get, that they don't have to pay for, yes i am jealous.
But that's okay. There is always a way around.
a) Sandwiches are really cheap when you make them yourself.
b) Cooking in a group means you get to split the grocery cost - thats a real good plus point.
Of course you can let yourself have a good meal say once every month or something, but there are always cheaper places to go to. All those frequent Café Hoppers - THERE IS YOUR PLANE TICKET TO ANOTHER COUNTRY.
Alternatively, cooking = learning a new skill and you'll never want to pay 4pounds for a sandwich from the school canteen that you can make yourself (Lesson learned after buying 3 not very nice sandwiches).
p.s. I use to be all obsessed over Starbucks and coffee, but now, no. 3 Starbucks drink = 1 night of hostel rental.
Also, packing lunch when going for day trips (see point 4) helps to save a lot more money!
3. Eating Less
No snacking, unless biscuits are on sale/under a pound.
Eat less but please don't starve yourself.
I don't mean go on a diet, or eat less than required to save money, but eating less snacks, and eating proper meals does save a lot. From the looks of it, I'm spending a lot on snacks. If you're like me, and prefer Tyrells / Kettle / any other more expensive brand of snacks, then this point is especially important.
I realise, 75p Sainsbury Brand Digestive Biscuits are so much cheaper and more worth it than a £2 bag of chips.
4. Taking Day Trips
This probably works only if you're in a bigger country with multiple intercity train lines. For a small country like Singapore, it would be hard to take day trips anywhere other than Johor Bahru in Malaysia.
But, after living in the European Continent, I realised taking Day Trips is an amazing way to travel, explore different cites, and save on the lodging fees. Lodging in most UK cities cost minimum about £15-20 a night, as a college student I don't have the ability to pay for that. So, taking day trips as opposed to weekend trips is a much better alternative.
Plus, by taking Day Trips you can take advantage of flash sales when it comes to train tickets. £10 for a return ticket is a pretty good deal don't you think :) I have already booked 2 day trips that are around £10 each.
Alternatively, you can always stayover/crash at a friend's place, or try couchsurfing. Since I have no experience in that (yet), I can't give any tips.
5. Recording EVERYTHING I purchase
This is so much harder for me than I could have ever imagined.
Honestly. I have never been good with recording my finances.
I tried keeping a log of what I spent on whilst in Paris, that sort of failed. After 2 months, I stopped recording down, probably because I was having an internship allowance.
But, there isn't any more inflow of cash whilst in London. And with that in mind, I must say, thus far I'm doing good. After 1 month in London, I think I'm within my budget - this includes having to buy things like pots, pillows, shoe rack, rail cards, and other settling in stuff.
Plus, recording everything diligently (as diligently as I can - 'A' for trying) shows you how much money is spent, and where. Using an excel sheet allows me to see how much I spend on groceries, travel, and other miscellaneous stuff.
I learnt a tip from a guy friend of mine. He told me that he recorded everything on his phone, and then transferred it all to an excel sheet maybe once a week. After adopting his method, it was a lot easier to keep a log of the outflow of cash from my pocket.
Prior to using his method, I would open my excel sheet everyday and attempt to recall what i've spent. But every time I turned on the computer, I open safari and that's it.
So, Thank You Daryl. I'm sure my parents would be proud of my new found financial recording ability.
People tend to restrict themselves because they don't see a possibility in certain things happening. Most people don't see a possibility in traveling because they believe it is expensive.
Recently, I've come to realise that money should NOT be a restriction. There is always a way to save up, to work, and to fight for your dreams - be it travel, art, photography. Mine is to travel. Money (or the lack of) should not be the determining factor.
I'm not going to make my parents pay for my traveling expenses, so that's what I've been doing and trying to do to ration my budget so as to be able to travel more during the breaks.
Let me know if you have more tips!
X
Pictures from Barcelona.
You Don't Have To Be Rich To Travel
22 November 2014
I've always thought coming to London would feel very much like academic liberation. For the past 2 years i've been telling myself, semester after semester: hang on a little tighter, just one more semester, work a little harder, stay up for another hour, pull your GPA up so it freezes at a decent level for exchange, one semester closer to exchange etc. It seemed as though every moment I spent working hard to do well in school, was for this one year of liberation, this ONE exchange.
I've heard stories from seniors about how their one semester exchange has been the best time of their life, how some visited up to 40 cities in half a year, how they travelled and didn't have to go to school because it was a pass/fail system. And I thought to myself, hey, i'm going to be there for a whole year, wouldn't that be double the fun?
Couple of my friends are currently on exchange programmes and started their semesters before I did. I saw pictures of them touring, and going for weekend trips; basically having SO MUCH FUN. I was confused and asked "what about school?" and the general consensus seemed to be - you study less when you're on an exchange.
Imperial College is a wonderful school. I chose Imperial over Berkeley because I believe that it would be a better transition for me into Chemical Engineering, and i'd be able to learn a lot more without the stress of keeping up my GPA.
Unfortunately, complications set in, and the curriculum seems to be way more intense than I expected because of certain "rules". Several uncertainties came along with this exchange, and it feels as though I'm fighting an academic war all over again.
I had a meeting with my personal tutor in Imperial (THEY ARE SO NICE TO THEIR STUDENTS!) the other day, and he asked me, "What do you want to get out of your exchange? And how are you going to measure your level of success in that?" Obviously he meant academic wise. I told him I had to think about it. Sure I had some academic goals for myself, but nothing was moderately related to any form of self-assessment. Assessment is what I was ESCAPING from this year.
But, he said that there is no use of setting goals when I had no way to measure my success of them, and that my time in Imperial would be more meaningful if I had a way of assessing myself in terms of these academic goals.
Truth be told, I don't have quantifiable academic goals. My goal, is to learn for the sake of learning, not for the examinations. Through learning french in France (and I'm utterly disappointed my jam-packed timetable means I don't have the ability to continue with that here!) I experienced what it felt like to learn because I wanted to, not because I had to.
I think the reason why I could not think of a way to assess myself - and still have no idea how I'm going to assess any form of academic achievement - during my time here is because I don't want to. I wanted to take this year to break away from all assessment, school, struggling to understand lectures, having 4 hours of sleep a day just to keep my grades up, and feeling like crap if I scored less than what people would expect of me. I wanted NOTHING to do with the pressures from grades and university education.
I want this academic year to be about learning outside of class. Seeing a different side of the world. Travelling, learning through people you meet in different countries/cities, exploring, and learning all the life lessons I would not get in school. Thats what a year abroad is suppose to be isn't it? If I wanted to have the stress of keeping my grades up, worrying if my credits will be accrued, trying to make sure I'm well-versed in certain subjects so that I don't struggle when I go back after this academic year, I might as well have stayed back in Singapore and studied my ass off.
Then again, my past experiences have very well taught me, that things don't always go the way you want them to. Working hard doesn't guarantee you success, and that if things go well for you, be thankful because you're one of the lucky ones.
I guess its never good to build up your expectations and have a preconceived notion about something, because when things don't go the way you expect them to, you're left disappointed.
That being said, I'm trying to stay positive, and improve my current situation as much as I can. I'm trying to learn to put less pressure on myself, and I'm still trying to come to terms with the fact that i'm not doing something I love or even like - even though I think it seems to be the most legitimate way for me to have the career that I believed I desire in the future.
Im still carrying the hope that things will turn around, that I will have the adventure of my lifetime this year. London is such a beautiful city. Having the time to explore the city alone would be amazing! But I'm still hoping that I will have the ability to travel and see different parts of the UK, experience different European cultures, and make the best of my time here.
Going to Barcelona in a few days - definitely a good time for me to get my mind off school.
Hopefully I am able to keep up with the curriculum when I get back. I'm feeling quite guilty for taking time off school, but since I'm stuck in school from 9am-5pm with only an hour break for lunch on my 21st birthday, and no form of a celebration, I feel this short trip is a warranted one.
There you have it. A little snippet of my life.
Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining. I'm eternally grateful for the opportunity to be in London, because its something I never expected myself to have. Just thought i'd share something a little more . I really do hope (and I still believe) this year of exchange will turn out to be a good one.
Pictures from an afternoon out and about in the area around Trafalgar Square, London.
Initial Thoughts About Exchange
19 October 2014 Trafalgar Square, London WC2N 5DN, UK
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