The Version of My Success

With Mr. Trump. Thanks, sir!

There are so many successful people out there. They achieve something precious for their lives. Some become so popular and get so much praise from other people. We can recognize how Bill Gates successfully built his Microsoft, and how Steve Jobs created Apple Inc. Nobody will denies that those two men have succeeded on their path.

Their lives have become inspiration for lots of people around the world. Their persistence to get their success gives us many lessons to study and to follow. Now, the question is what does success mean? Are those who are as rich as those two not successful persons? To agree or do not agree is part of of those questions. You can keep your answer now. I have a version of my success.

I spent all of my childhood in a country called Indonesia. I was born there about twenty two years ago. Anyway, Indonesia is an archipelago containing more than 17,000 islands. We have so many different ethnic groups. I am from one of them called Java. I was born in a little town, Blitar, which is located at Java Island, on of five largest islands there.

My late father was a local entrepreneur in Blitar. He fixed broken sewing machines and we earned money from that. We did not make much money from that job, just enough to meet our daily needs. My mom was the manager, which mean actually she had no job, just helped my dad. Nevertheless, both are the best parents ever for me!

But, regarding education, neither of my parents ever attended a college. The main causes are two. First, there was no enough money for more schooling. At that time, to enter a college was like trying to grab the sky. Impossible for those who were not rich enough.

Second, higher education was something hard to understand. People tended to get a job as soon as possible. Education is something like an appetizer of life. You can take or leave it.

I spent almost my whole education in Blitar. I went to kindergarten, elementary school, junior high school, and senior high school in that town. It was almost fifteen years. Since my parents did not have any college education, I decided that I had to be better than them both! I did not know it would guarantee my future or not, but I believed, it is going to work out. It would make my life colorful, at least.

I realize that to keep up with the globalization, being well educated is so damn necessary. Education is a key to open the gateway to a bright future. My mind came up with a statement, “Move and get to college or stay in my damn little town and become nobody.”

I tried to find the best way to get to college. But it was impossible to get money from my parents. Then I tried to find any scholarship. What was on my mind is just to find ways to make the “educational history” of my family expand. I had to find the way to get to collage no matter what!

At that time, such an opportunity was so difficult to find. But eventually I got it. I was accepted to get a scholarship called Paramadina Fellowship. I entered Paramadina University for a-four-year study there. I still remember how really happy my parents were. I got my step ahead to the colorful future.

Jakarta, where my university is located, is the capital city of Indonesia. Everything was different in the large city from my town. This city had many different people and it is where people across Indonesia dream to be. I met many different students with different backgrounds: mindsets, habits, and cultures. In there, I learnt to be a person who can live with different people and cultures. I could find everything here anyway: an abundance of academic materials, a fast access of information. But one thing that I feel most important is that I tasted a future here.

With Miss Jessica from
World Learning. Thanks, miss!

A scholar said, “Clever and civilized people will not be silent in their hometown, leave your land and migrate to another country.” I keep that saying deep in my mind. That always gives me some motivation to pursue something more. I had moved from my hometown to Jakarta. But it is not enough. I believe God did not create this world just as wide as Indonesia. I had to move and move, I felt.

I finally got to the United States. I got accepted to a program named Global Ugrad (2011-2012) that took me to Fargo, North Dakota to study at North Dakota State University (NDSU) for two semesters. That was my first time for going abroad, though, so sometimes I felt it was impossible. Twenty years I had been living in Indonesia and finally moved to a country that has really different seasons from my home.

In Fargo, I finally felt my 'brutal' winter for the first time ever, a weather that my country will never ever have. In that winter was my first time in looking at snow as well. To me, it is a dream of everybody from tropical countries.

Finally, what is the correct version of my success? I am of course not like Bill Gates or Steve Jobs, yet I am who I am. I have my own life plan and what I should think is how far I can meet that plan. I have a plan to get a better education. I also want other people being well educated.

At least, by being educated, I can share what I have got to others, like sharing this article, discuss with them, or even get them more educated. We can get more and more knowledge from everybody, everywhere and at every single time, can’t we? Well, success, to me, is not a comparison of one’s achievements to another one’s, but it is a comparison of one’s plan to how that becomes fulfilled. Am I a successful person? Maybe yes. No, maybe not… yet.

This article is edited from the original paper with the same title submitted as my first ever English paper assignment in my life. Thanks a lot to World Learning that brought me there. And, thanks to Mr. Andy Trump for a semester long teaching me.