Welcome back to Jakarta (XIX)

That day I arrived in Jakarta, I went straight away to my uncle Risjar’s house in Rawamangun it’s not too far with the house where I spent my childhood in, here I am back to Jakarta I said to myself. I got a warm welcome from my uncle and aunt and cousins. God I can’t believe that I am in Jakarta again. I also managed to meet my old friends from elementary school and junior high school. I also visited my old neighbors and the owner of the house our family had rented from for about seven years. Nothing much changed though I could see the house I used to live was still like before only the paint had started to fade and not too well maintained. It was now lived by bunch of students, apparently the house was rented to university students from IKIP Ramamangun.

The days were passing by, I was still waiting for the university admission test (UMPTN) to come out, I would say that I wasn’t that excited of the test result, knowing that the possibility to be accepted was small because the majors and universities I selected were among the best and most favorites. So I was also thinking about a back up, but I didn’t really think going to private universities at all like many other people were thinking and aiming, because that option was not feasible for me. So instead I was taking a polytechnic test at University of Indonesia in Depok. My elementary school friend I Gede Surya Sempana and I were taking a train to the University of Indonesia campus complex to have the test. When we got there we registered and had a series of tests. Like usual I wasn’t much convinced that I would pass the test knowing that I wasn’t that successful when doing the tests, and also not to mention the very tough competition we had.

Finally the day I had been waiting for came, the UMPTN test result came out, it’s there in almost every national news papers, I hurried myself to buy and read Kompas daily news paper to see the result, there was a big announcement with the list of students who passed the test. I checked the paper thoroughly in every page, I couldn’t find my name there, I tried it again and again hoping that I missed it, but still I couldn’t find my name there. My name wasn’t there meaning that I didn’t pass, after all I knew that I wouldn’t pass though. There’s one opportunity left, that was the polytechnic test result, unlucky me, I also didn’t pass.

to be continued...