Letter From the Editor: Another School Year, Another Set of New Faces

To the reader of this editorial, I welcome you (back) to the University of Waterloo and am glad to see that most of you are (again) ready to soak up the craziness that is Engineering at Waterloo. Like most of you first years, I am experiencing a pseudo-first as well; I am experiencing my first case of writer’s block (and I’ve been writing regularly for three years!). Maybe, it’s the pressure of having a full page allocated for me to share whatever wisdoms I have but it could be that I’m sleep-deprived; who know! It could also be that I using this editorial to provide advice to first years on how to survive your first year in university or how to get involved has been played out so many times in the last couple of weeks that I’m sure you all are now tired of hearing it. Instead, I think I’ll share some highlights of my life in university as it is slightly informative, definitely amusing, and is a great way to eat up space in an editorial *thumbs up*.
Before, I get into all the fun stuff, let me introduce myself. I’m Farzi, a nanotechnology engineering student about to finish third year this term. I attended high school in the almost non-existent town of Ajax and, since so many people have asked, I spent the majority of my childhood in the city of Nairobi, Kenya. Like most of my classmates, I chose the Nano program because I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life and the name of the program sounded cool. With that said, my interests go past just science; they range from English literature to Renaissance art. While this may interest you as well, I differ in one significant way – once I am interested in a certain topic, I must learn EVERYTHING about it. This can be a good thing or bad thing depending on the situation (and, trust me, I’ve experienced both). In being prone to learn about topics that interest me, I also consider it an asset that I am an avid reader.
Now, storytime! In my 1A term, save Orientation Week where even the meekest go crazy, I was too shy to introduce myself to others and was too reluctant to go out to meetings out of fear of outside judgement. Yes, that’s how bad my insecurities were in first year. I clung onto my high school friends for dear life and kept the friends I made during Orientation Week close as a consequence of fear of lonliness in this unfamiliar situation. This was quite contrary to my role as a “bridge” in high school where my friends would be distributed among the extremes of cliques in our school – yes, we had cliques too.
Then, one day in the middle of my 1B term, I was dragged to a meeting by a classmate and was promised sustenance in exchange for my company. I was pulled by the hand into the room and was actually placed on a couch with a cookie in hand in exchange for the hour of mindless gabble I sat through. From that point, I realized that, in order, to get the most of out of my university experience, I would have to suck it up and reach out to others even if it meant repeatedly getting those feelings of insecurity; essentially, I had to train myself to talk to others. Fastforward a couple of years and I brought myself to the point where I was holding the same hour-long sessions of mindless gabble with a confidence that I couldn’t hope to have in my first year.
With such conditioning, I quickly found a group of close friends that mysteriously gravitated to one another; I, for one, cannot recall , to this day, the situations in which I attained most, if not all my friendships. While it seems that this happened through forces outside my control, I strongly believe that without some formative intrapersonal work on my part, I’m almost certain that I wouldn’t have such a great support system around me. In addition to this great set of friends, I also automatically had a social life, so to speak. I’ve got to say that some of the best memories I have consist of my meeting random strangers and taking the unexpected with stride. For example, on one amazing night after attending a house party, I was given twenty dollars in exchange for my silence, given ten free salsa lessons for being too perky at four in the morning, and given the best early morning breakfast I could possibly hope for, all at the same time! This is the kind of story that I love to tell since it is one so bizarre that it’s almost unbelievable; however, you can’t make this kind of think up. If you are curious to hear more, feel free to drop by the Iron Warrior office and ask me about it. In fact, I might just be extra jovial as this proves that you read the editorial that was all too painful to write! While I had my fun in second year, personal growth and my increased awareness on all fronts causeed a shift in priorities yet again. To act on that shift, I assumed more responsibility by notably becoming a member of the Board of Directors for the Waterloo Engineering Endowment Fund (WEEF) and assuming the position of Editor-In-Chief of the Iron Warrior newspaper. Never fear, I still had kept some time for fun (of a different kind) by taking on other projects that were inherently enjoyable due to its nature. I could spend another few paragraphs talking about all of this but I think it would just be easier if you ask me about it than my writing on. Before I continue on, I want to apologize to all my friends as most of them will be learning these things about me for the first time. I am usually secretive of all things pertaining to my personal life of which my friends have noted many times over. Believe me, it was one of my many idiosyncrasies that I’ve resolved to change permanently.
One event that I’m sure will be a highlight of my time in university was the opening of the Quantum-Nano Centre (or QNC) last Friday. Among the common reasons for noting this as an important event, one of which being that our program has a central space to congregate in, there are a couple of unconventional reasons that makes the QNC special to me. For one, while most marvel at the potential functions of this building and the promise it holds for the future, I am awed more by the building itself. Let me explain; when I was given a tour of the building a month before the opening by Scott Nicoll, the Special Projects and Facilities Manager for the Faculty of Science, I was given a blow-by-blow of the architectural and functional features of the building. Maybe this catered to the visual artist in me (yes, this is another one of my hobbies), but I was completely floored by the awesome-ness of this building. The amount of thought and innovation within the framework of the building so impressed me that I almost forgot about the fact that I would not step foot in it until my 4A term. What impressed me the most about the building was the amazing amount of functional flexibility (that’s almost unheard of in a building that requires such strict requirements and constraints).
Now, that I’ve read back through the rest of the editorial to finally make a not-so-sucky conclusion, I’ve realized that I’ve implicitly kept a common theme throughout this entire editorial. The cohesion I found between all of the ideas presented was my appreciation for adaptibility.
Between high school and university, I needed to adapt to the drastic change in surroundings in order to thrive in this new situation. This meant my ‘opening up’ to new people and new experiences even if it meant having to face my fear of the unknown time and again. However, this does not mean that there is a void of change through the next five years of university. Given the increase in observational capacity, personal struggle and growth, changes in my priorities, and even changes in my group of friends, it is safe to say that such variations in our surroundings are still as drastic as the day you moved away from your mother’s home cooking and laundry services.
With this thought in mind, I will afford this one piece of wisdom: do not be afraid to to change in response to an unfamiliar situation. Yes, it’s important that you keep your individual percepts but it is important to not discredit the need to change yourself in the face of something new. I can easily say that I’ve become more easy-going and can take setbacks with stride (which is much more than I can say from before). Additionally, I have become more easy-going amidst the chaos of university life, especially when things don’t turn out as planned. In putting together this paper, I fell flat on my face too many times to count and had to disengage from the plan I had set for myself and work with what had been presented to me. I’m sure that many of you have experienced such an event but I must say that being able to switch gears at the drop of a hat makes our lives a little easier and a lot more exciting. With that, I sign off by wishing you a pleasant day and a pleasant term to follow.