HIT ME BABY ONE MORE TIMEEEE

Another student dropped by my office yesterday, and, wouldn't you know it, ended up having a casual chat with me and popped that question. The one about why oh why I chose this job out of the many better ones out there. He wanted to take a major* similar to mine, and boy, didn't I notice his nervousness about ending up in profession similar to mine also. So I assured him that I had many other choices, don't worry Kid, just you take this major if you want to and don't worry about the possibilities of ending up as a lecturer, in my case, I had many other job offers but this one profession chose me. I didn't choose it. It chose me.

That was what I told him. Because I couldn't tell him, or anyone for that matter, the truth.
Which is: I am a masochist.
There is nothing more exhilarating for me than busting my ass off trying to keep my head above the water, and that is the main reason why this profession chose me.

And that was also precisely why I chose to study electrical engineering. Though stupid as I might be, I'd known since I was 12 that I'd ace English literature easily. The language never ceases to amaze me, I love the grammar and am good at it (and not ashamed to acknowledge it), I love reading and I write constantly. I know in English Lit faculty you're not only reading and writing fictions and poetry for hours on end, you're required to read plays and act them out too. And I love those. I love reading plays and I enjoy role-playing. In fact, after watching my role-playing in different occasions (mainly during teaching trainings), several people mentioned that I could act well.

But taking an English major would not be satisfying. I wanted to fry my brains, experience near brains-hemorrhage, choke and gasp for air for the rest of my life. So Electrical Engineering it is. Hence started my neverending dreams of having even more difficult exams (I first had my series of exam-dreams in highschool) and the continuous struggle to keep myself from going completely hysterical.

Well, who wouldn't go hysterical having to solve differential-equations and the likes? I might complain now and then, but deep inside I like it; and the more difficult and nerve-wrecking and painful it is, the more I like it. Somebody told me that once. And he was so damn right.

This masochism in me inevitably ventures out of my choice of education major from time to time. But I have to take good care of myself so no more bashing in bed although sometimes I'm dying for one.

One good song to accompany this post would be that one by Britney Spears, herself looks like a masochist tramp (and I love her for that) which goes "hit me baby one more timeeee" (insert a fragile looking female wanting a good whip here). Oh or anything by Christina Aguilerra (even more masochist-looking, even more trampish, and I love her even more than Britneybabe).

You see? How can I tell anyone why I ended up as a lecturer of electrical engineering? I can't just go "Because I am a masochist", at least not without black eyeshadow and false eyelashes and tight cropped t-shirt, a la Christina Aguilerra.

Any ideas?



*Electrical Engineering, concentrating in telecommunication engineering.