My Second Semester at UI; Discovering Invaluable Experiences

            As a child, I was always told that the best teacher was a practical experience, but apparently I had not put myself into practice to prove its worthiness until this semester. My first most intriguing experience began as I was engaged in a volunteering project held by a Japanese non-governmental organization. Surprisingly enough, in addition to being the liaison officer, I was also urgently requested to become a teacher for an intensive-class aimed at catching up materials for the high school national examinations at Sekolah Master Indonesia, Depok. More days passed, after questioning and doubting my capacity and self-confidence in standing in front of a big class, I eventually approved the request and began to teach. Even more surprisingly, the first class-meeting went really well; students were enthusiastic, and my Japanese friends who were supervising in the class said that I had a natural sense to becoming a teacher, which I would not have even thought. After teaching for a month, a substantial change emerged to witness; I acquired more confidence in speaking in front of many people, which helped me a great deal in delivering presentations in my classes this semester. On the other hand, a little contrastive, failing in scholarship applications may not turn out to be intriguing experiences for most people, but it seemed to me that these experiences were beyond precious. This semester, I failed in getting scholarships from Tanoto Foundation and PPSDMS Nurul Fikri. However, since I got the opportunities to join the selections until the last phases, which enabled me to meet the other applicants and witness their capabilities, I learned that I needed to make ample improvements in order to secure a scholarship in the future. As time passed, I began to realize that I was improving in multitude aspects; my writings got better; my presentations got more attentions since I practiced making use of body language and intonation which I learned from the scholarship selections, and I became more organized because I had a goal to pursue. In conclusion, I learned that practical experiences were indeed the best teacher, and I did also prove how much they were worth.