“I want to go to Melbourne!” came onto my mind loud and clear after a talk on Melbourne University’s admission, organized by Cecilia Huang, my genetic engineering lecturer back in 1998. Even before that, I knew that I will want to do part of my education overseas if I have the chance and had told my mum as early as 1996.
Between polytechnic graduation and Melbourne lies a 3 year stretch for national service and the waiting time flanking it. My mind had not waivered since the initial intention. Melbourne seems to be a reasonable choice. For whatever reason, the name itself gave me a feel of gentle cosiness, less of the hassle of the Singapore city life, which I later found out to be quite true. I knew that University of Melbourne is a good choice as Adeline Koh (my plant lecturer) had highly recommended it to me. Other than this recommendation, I did not know anything about university rankings or even whether a ranking existed back then – it is an act of instinct.
I cannot remember when I applied for a place in university. It might have been around March or April of 2000. All I can remember was that it was a rainy Saturday and Joel (then we called him as Yeong Chit), my polytechnic final year project (FYP) mate, went to the education fair hosted by Australian High Commission in Singapore. It was there I came to know Alvin Chew, an adviser in Overseas Academic Link, helping people like to navigate the application process, and Penny Fairbank who reviewed my application. Penny was the international manager for science faculty in University of Melbourne.
The first letter from Melbourne was a shock – I was not given any credit exemptions when I had expected 2 years of exemption. I believe I had waited for a week before I called up the only person I can turn to – Alvin Chew – by chance, I saw his name card in my wallet. Alvin advised me to bring the package down to his office at Tong Eng Building in Shenton Way, which I did the following week. He sorted it out for me and I was granted 2 years credit exemption and only had to spend a year to get my bachelors. I believe my path might be very different if I had not kept the name card as I had already received 2 years credit exemption from Queensland University of Technology on the same day I applied to Melbourne. Since then, I kept all name cards.
It must be around October of 2000 or April of 2001 that Edwin, the other FYP mate of mine, applied to Melbourne as well. This time round, the event was held at Mandarin Marina and Edwin’s application was received by Derek Chan, Deputy Dean of Science. Edwin got accepted with 2 years credit exemptions as well. I later came to know from Alvin that Melbourne only accepts polytechnic graduates with full exemptions or reject the application totally.
I decided to go for July 2002 intake as my national service ends too close to the February 2002 intake and kicked the ball rolling in December 2001. The pressure of doing well and knowing the financial burden this decision weighs on my parents, marbled into the excitement of fulfilling my dreams - I went on a roller coaster emotional ride since I got my offer. On my grandmother’s birthday BBQ in July 2001, Uncle Derrick conversed with me extensively before delivering the verdict to my parents – I should have the emotional strength to leave Singapore and understood the implications of this decision. This declaration is like an auditor’s statement – not much use on its own but cannot do without. Till that point in time, nobody had given me any form of assurance that I can handle it. On hindsight, this assurance did help to anchor down a few loose strings.
Sent Edwin off to Melbourne on either the 2nd or 3rd day of Chinese New Year of 2002. He had decided to go ahead a semester earlier than me and Joel, which is good – staggering out makes transition easier. Joel and I, together with Robin, were due to fly to Melbourne on July 6, 2002, on Quantas QF10. Robin is my friend in army and will be studying at Monash University.
As the day drew closer, the anxiety and pressure seems to be building up. I became increasing uncertain about my decision and the expectation is great. It is really a one-chance event. If I screwed it up, there will be no second chance. I think all of us, polytechnic graduates with modest financial support, felt the same to varying degrees. It is just that we never really spoke to each other about it. It was one of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” situations. To me, I just do not want to open up this can of worms and increase the anxiety in myself and others, for I know there is really no solution but to face head-on.
Between then and the fateful day, I wrote 3 poems – 5 weeks, 2 days and on the day itself.
The theme is rather clear – anxiety – the anxiety of the unknown. I had asked Keith Ng about how he had felt back then, as he went to Melbourne a semester before me to do his degree in accounting. “It feels like going to BMT all over again” he said, and he is right. This is almost the exact feeling – as mixture of anxiety, pressure and numbness – as I board the fast-craft on that very day, 18th August 1999, my enlistment.
I had nearly 2 weeks before enrolment start when I reached Melbourne during which Joel and myself were exploring Melbourne City. Joel was my roommate at Calton Melbourne College (CMC). I guessed there is a little apprehension having a roommate as this is the first time I have to share a room – too used to having my own room at home. Nevertheless, it was an interesting experience despite some differences in opinions and handling each other’s pet peeves. For example, our bedtimes are really different; Joel can handle heat better than cold while I am just the opposite. The first night was especially interesting because we had a double-decker bed and originally, I was on the top deck but in the middle of the night, I was sweating profusely (it was winter and we had the heater on) on the upper deck while Joel is shivering in cold on the lower deck – decided to swap the very next day. It was around this time that I gave Joel his nickname – 
We had Ian Ong (my army friend at 20SA) at Melbourne at that point in time. He went to Melbourne a semester earlier and was enrolled in RMIT. Lucky for us, he showed us the city. The next time I met Robin was a few days later. I was supposed to meet Tristan in Chapel Street and I stupidly thought that everywhere is walkable in Melbourne. Managed to get Robin to walk with me to Chapel Street (almost 90 minutes walk) and dumped him at the Virgin music store along Chapel Street when I was to meet Tristan. Well, Robin still remembers that incident – must be one of the things he will remember for life. Luckily, it was winter and cooling, so the walk is not that bad.
During those 2 weeks, Joel and I explored most of the university and Melbourne City by foot, walking to as far south as Melbourne Art Museum at St Kildas. It was winter. The temperature was manageable but the wind was demanding. For sure, I could not gel my hair as I usually did before – It will end up as a sculpture if I did. Melbourne is easy to navigate. The city is just 18 main roads – 9 of them running North-South, 9 running East-West. The problem is that you will have to tell someone the junction if you want to meet anyone. Daimaru just closed down and Melbourne Central was rather empty though it has its charm. Melbourne Central was built over the Shot Tower which was where they made pellets for rifles – by dropping molten lead at the top of the tower, gravity will shape the lead, cool it down before it hits the ground. I love Melbourne city for the mix of antique and modern skyline though it is terribly difficult to find a public toilet.
My first impression of Melbourne University was pretty good. I love South Lawn with the granite buildings overlooking it. There is a rustic mix of granite buildings and brick buildings which have no bearing in the age of the buildings. For example, the building directly across CMC was called “1888 Building” as it was built in 1888 for education faculty, if I am not wrong. 1888 was less than 40 years since the foundation of the university but 1888 Building was brick. On the other hand, the buildings around South Lawn were granite. Walking into 1888 Building, I was able to see the convoluted passage ways, almost creaky floors that bear the agony of the weight and tight corridors that speak of antiquity. It was much later that I realized that the granite buildings around South Lawn, and South Lawn itself, were modelled after the Scenic walk and the Great Hall of Sydney University.
CMC has a few interesting characters and stories. Both Joel and I were kind of “mature-aged” compared with most of the residents there who were doing their foundation year at Trinity College or their first year of university. And due to our eventual workload, we hardly clicked with anyone there. Personally, I found the communal kitchen to be a daily warzone and I do pity the cleaner. Over the year, I had seen egg exploding in microwave oven (someone tried to microwave an egg without de-shelling), pizza slices exploding in microwave (trying to microwave a stack of pizza slices). There were really good cooks and really bad ones. There was a Singaporean girl doing economics and had no idea what is bite-size. Some of the others had to help she sieve out broccoli after she had cut them and told her to cut certain pieces into 2s and some into 3s – they were just too large to stir-fry.
I did have my stupid moments in kitchen too. There was once when I tried to “fixed” printed ink onto paper to make it non-washable by microwaving, in an attempt to cross-link or cellulize the ink. It ended up catching fire instead but was put out quickly as I was watching the event unfolding in the microwave oven. Joel did not know about this at all.
Had decided to visit Sydney and Wollongong where Tristan was before I even left for Melbourne. It is a kind of holiday to put my nerves at ease before term start. Took a Greyhound bus to Sydney via Canberra. The entire journey was about 12 hours – about 900km. During the stopover along Hume highway, I had a bottle of chocolate milk – bad choice. Four hours after that, my tummy was churning. It was then I realized that the milk in Australia was not low-lactose milk as what I will get in Singapore. After some experimentation, I found that I can safely handle about 300ml of milk without problems. Anything more than that, I will have a stomach upset. By the time I left Australia in 2008, that was increased to about 600ml – a far cry from the litre of milk that I used to drink in Singapore.
By the time I reached Wollongong (about 100km south of Sydney), it was about 9am and got to Tristan’s place. We took a walk at Wollongong beach and went southwards to Bombo and Kiama (120km south of Sydney) to look at natural rock formations there. The vastness of the Pacific Ocean before us was breath-taking. Looking behind us and seeing our own footsteps pressed into the soft, chilly sand – a realization, that’s where we came from. The intertwined footsteps is a microcosm of my history – some people will come and cross my path; some will walk a distance with me and leave; at the end of the say, I start the journey alone and pretty much destined to end the journey alone. Time and memories might capture the steps but at the end of the day, all will be erased by nature itself. What’s left of it all? Nothing. Suddenly, there was a sense of peace that I wanted but the peace was also a little disturbing on my psyche. It is a weird feeling – peaceful and yet too calm. Peaceful but impressionable; calm but erasing. What is really there? There is actually nothing.
Sydney is a very different place compared to Melbourne – certainly messier in terms of city planning. To some extent, Sydney has some resemblance to Singapore with all the convoluted roads. Not much initial impression of Sydney except that I finally get to see Sydney Opera House for the first time and tasted wasabi ice-cream. On the negative side, I had also eaten the most horrible curry chicken in my stay in Australia – at the food court in Chinatown. It tasted like chicken soup with chilli. Luckily, there are better tasting ones in Sydney and in Melbourne. Having said that, I had also tasted the most concentrated carrot juice – 15 to 17 thick carrots juiced into a cup with no ice nor water added. It was awesome when the lady brings up a basket of carrots and start juicing them.
My first semester in the university – 4 subjects, 1 practical, 16 hours per week. As final year entry students, I have to choose a major immediately. There were enough credit hours for 2 majors, I know that the best bet was molecular biology but I was not so sure of the other – either genetics or cell biology. Came to realize that cell biology and molecular biology had 2 overlapping subjects which was the tipping point to choose molecular biology and cell biology. At the same time, I was a little hesitant if I loved genetics that much then. Joel and I took the same majors with functional genomics, plant biochemistry, developmental biology, and hormone and neurotransmitter biochemistry for the first semester. In retrospect, I rationalized that I needed to boost up my plant knowledge and I could read genetics papers by me. That was pure rubbish even though that was my publicized argument. I cannot fully justify to myself, even to today, why I chose this combination and not others.
I resumed my sleeping habit in class. Not that I did not want to pay attention but I could not help it. Sleeping in class is like the best way that I learn the key points. What was shocking to me was the amount of technology in class – a number of students were armed with tape recorders and I remembered that there was a student in functional genomics that came with a video camcorder! For me, it was just my sleepy head and I. The most difficult aspect of my final year was not the content but getting used to the tone and slang of the lecturers. Most classical case was hormone and neurotransmitter biochemistry which was about phosphorylation, dephosphorylation and kinases. After 20 repetitions of those words, I just gave up and gone back to sleep. On the other hand, some lecturers were just interesting. Part of plant biochemistry was taught by Ken Gayler (eventually became Head of Biochemistry) and he never looked at anyone in the class as he lectures – just the floor, his slides and the table. Mary Familari who taught me part of developmental biology was an excited talker – the more excited she is, the faster she talks until she sounded like an accelerated Donald Duck – we have to slow her down to make sense of her words.
Mary’s research area then was on gut (stomach) development. For a while, I cannot understand what is so interesting about the stomach until I went to talk to her one day after my gym session. She acknowledged that a stomach is really just a muscular bag and nothing really interesting about it. However, she needed a research focus to get her into university. So that was it. I do not have to be doing great things; I just have to be doing good and focused things. This reminded me of something I knew back then from the computing world. Someone was commenting online that he was earning good money doing dBase IV programming. Yes, dBase IV is fast declining back in 2002 but neither the education system nor anyone was really interested to pick up dBase then. As a result, the supply of dBase IV professionals was declining faster than the demand for it; thus, he was in comparatively high demand. The same concept could have applied here – I will need to have an area where the competition is not strong so that I can stand out in the crowd. Similarly, Ken Gayler had also mentioned that there were probably only 3 research groups in the world working on chloroplast then. This concept has a great influence on me.
Looking back, I think I will still choose to take developmental biology again. There cannot be a more interesting cell biology subject with this much content of weird gene names, like sonic hedgehog, son of sevenless, wingless, etc. It also taught me that the notochord runs the entire length of the embryo and by virtue of that, the ass and the head are adjacent to each other in the earliest part of human development. Maybe that is why some human think with their ass. It must be a developmental error. Anyone wants to do a thesis on this hypothesis?
Only through developmental biology that I can understand Lewis Wolpert’s words - It is not birth, marriage, or death, but gastrulation, which is truly the most important time in your life. I am not able to refute that and I do not believe anyone can.
I joined the Melbourne University Computer Students’ Association (MUCSA) to get to know more people and to keep in touch with my computing. Well, I had not completed my Advanced Diploma in Computing (from National Computing Centre, UK) when I started my bachelors in Melbourne. Anyway, MUCSA was originally started by an undergraduate, Tennessee Leeuwenburg, whom I will cross path again in the future.
One of the biggest reasons that I can attribute to the pleasant experience (socially) in Melbourne was that I had Edwin and gang there before us. And it was during then that we had established some sort of a routine where we will dine out on weekends, especially Friday dinners, followed by coffee session at a different restaurant. When Edwin did not have a car, we were restricted to city. After which, we explored many other places like Boxhill, Glen Waverley and so on. I remembered that there was once we even drove to Geelong (about 110km away from Melbourne) for dinner at Smoggies. Although the dinners were good, it was the company that was more important. Till today, I love the company of friends having coffee together. To some extent, the coffee sessions were more important than the food itself. This had been the on-going theme for my life in Melbourne and still holds true for me now – nothing beats coffee or tea session after a meal. Today, Edwin will say that he is familiar with the culture of coffee after a meal. That was when this culture was forged. In fact, by my honours year, a meal would feel incomplete without the coffee as a sequel unless there are compelling reasons not to have it, such as rushing a thesis or report.
It was also in that year that I had my first drinking buddy, Jeffrey Tan Chee Yong. He was in Melbourne for a year to do his degree and both of us love wine. So, once in a few weeks when we have more time, we will share 2 bottles of wine at his place. Jeffrey is no longer in science now. He went back to army as an officer.
Probably at around October 2002, Leslie Gondor (President of MUCSA) came up with the idea of an undergraduate computing conference on grounds that there are many conferences for postgraduates but hardly any to showcase undergraduate work. His idea was accepted by Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering (under engineering faculty) and supported by Department of Information Systems (under science faculty). This conference came to be known as Australian Undergraduate Students’ Computing Conference (AUSCC) and I was involved in the publications team, with the inaugural AUSCC held in early 2004. Looking back, I think a fair bit of learning how to run a conference and the logistics involved actually came from this experience. Since then, I was involved in 2 subsequent years as steering committee secretary, running the conference in RMIT in 2005 and in ANU in 2006.
In the second semester (February 2004), Joly came over to Melbourne for her undergraduate degree as well. She had signed on as a paramedic in civil defence since polytechnic graduation. I remembered telling her that knowing she was to do her science degree was like coming home. I was not sure where I got the impression from but I knew it instinctively that she will be back to do science eventually. To start the ball rolling into her first semester, Robin and I went to Great Ocean Road together with Joly’s friends. That was my first trip to Great Ocean Road.
Well, my results in the first semester were terrible and that was the last time Melbourne University used Melbourne Showgrounds as exam venue – sitting in concentric circles for papers is just strange. I got a H3 for developmental biology and just a pass for the other 3 subjects, giving an average of just 63. I had expected poor results for hormone and neurotransmitter biochemistry as I had misread a question which cost me 20 marks in exams. There is nobody to blame besides myself as I was too confident and perhaps even arrogant then and submitted a 2.5-hour paper in 1.5-hour. How could I be so dumb to even have similar answers for 2 questions? This is just how blinding confidence can be – I was deaf and blind to myself. I did not expect to score so badly for the other 3 subjects. As a result of my damaged confidence, I had even considered if this was really suitable for me. I came to realise that I had belittled the subjects and had to suffer the consequences for the next 2 years, both financially and emotionally. On hindsight, I guessed life has a way to jot me back to reality when I start to get my head in the clouds and this was one of the many of such happenings to come my way. It is almost like I have a tracker in life throws me shit every time I get too far ahead of myself. Perhaps this is how life keeps me grounded – by slapping a wet ticket on every time I needed it but never wanting it.
With this dismal result, my honours dream was in tatters. I needed an average of 65 to qualify for honours. I was back in Singapore then when the results were released and I desperately needed advice. Furthermore, I am a mid-year intake student; hence, my honours timing does not fall into the standard academic year. I met up with Alvin Chew at OAL who fixed a meeting with Penny Fairbank, International Manager for Science Faculty, when she was in town then. She suggested that I should write to Derek Chan, Deputy Dean of Science, about this as Derek was also taking care of international students. On her part, she will inform Derek as well.
That was what I did and in the email. As I am familiar with Mary, Derek got Mary to assist me in this while letting the Head of Zoology, Marilyn Renfree, know about this. The matter got rolled around and Mary introduced me to my would-be honours and PhD supervisor, Kevin Roy Nicholas. I must really thank her for this. By the time I started my second semester, there was consideration to do an honours with Kevin. And what surprised me was that Kevin did not ask me about my results. I assumed that he knew about it but I never really found out the reason, even today.
Even then, I still have to rescue my results and improve my standing. I did 2 things for the second semester. For every hour of lecture, I spent at least 30 minutes re-lecturing myself by asking questions to myself and linking the knowledge between different subjects together. For mid-year intake, this meant that I was doing the “easier” part of my majors in the second semester but I was cautious not to be complacent this time round. The good thing is that I had completed my Advanced Diploma in Computing by then. If anything else, it is a good ego-booster. In addition, I had applied to do an internship with Robbert de Iongh who taught me a part of developmental biology as well. The fact was that Robb was a potential consideration for my honours work and I needed a place to boost both my profile as well as my technical skills.
That semester was challenging because I will have to proof my worth to do honours. Even Joly had commented that I was no longer as relaxed as during my polytechnic days. She was right. I was indeed stressed up. The only notable academic incident was in Cell Biology III where one of the assignments was a 3000-word review article. I wrote on Huntington disease and got the highest mark in class. Mary was impressed.
In the end, I managed to pull my honours entry score (average of the top 7 out of 8 third year science subjects) to 68, from 63 in the first semester. And I had decided to work with Kevin for my honours on the basis that I would be working on microarrays and will have a chance for me to see if I like to do bioinformatics.
Applying for honours in mid-year was a big issue as well. There was only 5 weeks between the releases of the exam result to the start of honours year. During these 5 weeks, we have to repeat all the administrative procedures of getting accepted, paying tuition fees, getting a Certificate of Enrollment (COE) from international office, applying of visa, medical checkups, all before the granting of the visa to start the course.
I had primed Penny on this during one of our coffee chats about 2 months before hand. Everything was a rush once exam result was released – I went to the faculty office to collect my acceptance that very morning, went to Post Office to pay my tuition fees, took the receipt to international office for processing and collected my COE the very next day.
Nearing the end of our final year, both Joel and I decided to move out of CMC. I guessed I still prefer to have my own room. To a certain extent, I think I was never fully comfortable with sharing room given that I had my own room since primary school. However, neither of us was very sure that we can make it to honours year, certainly not for me, given my abyssal results in the first semester. I still remembered that we had a discussion about this over dinner in the city – we shall just sign the bond and hope for the best. If anyone of us cannot make it to honours, then we will break the tenancy contract on grounds of lack of visa. Our new home was up a slope on Queens Street in the city.