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Since the end of last year game, I found myself lost interest in staying in the team anymore. If the seniors hadn’t appointed me to be one of the deputy, I think I would not be at where I am now.

For one reason, I have no confident in things I do. When someone is doing the same thing as mine and come out better than what I did, and he uses his result to give comment on mine, I’ll be de-motivated. This has happened for quite sometimes and I find it really irritating. I know there’re always better people around me and I really wish to learn from them, but in this case it’s really just like he’s purposely comparing his result with mine. I wonder why does people just like to step on others.

I used to think that no matter what I do, someone is never satisfied.

I used to think that someone always give pressure to others based on what he himself is good at.

I used to think as a deputy, the words I said can change things and motivate others.

Last night, I’ve a chat with one of the juniors. Currently he’s in-charge of all the management and “internal affair” of the team. To my surprise, after the long chat, I realized that:

- Things are not as bad as I thought.

- Different people have different way of “motivating” each other, just that the methods they used might not be suitable.

- To some juniors, I am who I am… but for some, I’m just a great talker little doer.

All these while I’ve been so self-centered. I’ve always been blinded by the prejudice I have against that one particular person that I neglected my responsibility for the remaining 23 members in the team.

When I was in my mid-teen age, I used to be a rebellious son. Everything my parents said, I’d find excuses to fight back, to show them that I was right. But little did I know that my parents have something that I never have, even til now…

Patience.

Being a leader is never an easy task. So what does it take to be a good leader?

Life is never fair. No matter how we dislike something, there’re times we have to bear with it in order to pleased others. Instead of being irrational, there’re things we need to sacrifice in order for other people to bring good to everyone. Being a leader is not about wanting people to walk your path, but to walk with people at the same path.

14 days left to competition, and the team’s spirit is deteriorating due to final exam in these two weeks. Just hope that in these two weeks time I can play my part, to change what I have done.

We should have known the procedures… I’m grateful that I’m still sitting here blogging, and not behind the bars.

Yesterday the team leader and I went to Singapore to get some electronic equipments for the team. The total amount spent was SG$1925, convert to Ringgit is SG$1925 x 2.4 conversion rate = RM4620.

It was a very unlucky day for us. As we passed the Malaysia Custom on our journey back, we got caught for carrying two “suspicious” plastic bags. That’s the first time I realize Malaysia Custom is so “efficient”. A few aunties in front of us carried some plastic bags quite similar to us, but nothing happened to them…

After being inspected by a few officers, we’re notified that we’ve two choices:

1) Go to jail.

2) Pay for import tax 30% plus a compound amount of 10 times for ILLEGALLY IMPORTING GOODS FROM FOREIGN COUNTRY.

So the mathematics is:

RM4620 x 30% tax x 1o compounding rate = RM 13860 !!!

WTH….?!!

When we’re caught, we’ve expected to pay for a certain amount, but nothing around THIS AMOUNT came into our mind. From a RM 4K++ goods, we’re now going to pay an extra three times the amount…

… and that was the time we realized both of us have “excellent story telling” skills. We tried to explained to the officers about the usage of those equipments, telling them we’re just students… bla, bla, bla…

After the long negotiation, they finally decided that we only have to pay the tax, which is RM1300. Obviously we didn’t have that amount in hand at that moment after spending on those equipments. We’re released and our goods will remain under confiscation until we pay the tax.

This morning we consulted our adviser. Fortunately, he has some “contact” to help us regarding this matter. If nothing goes wrong, we’ll be able to get our equipments back by next Monday.

3 lessons learned:

1) If you’re to buy something from Singapore, make sure you bring a bunch of people so you can divide and hide everything inside their bags. =p

2) Do not panic when you’re caught. If you’re nervous, you might end up being fork out much more.

3) Don’t play play with the government regarding MONEY matters. If you wanna play, make sure you play LEGALLY.

Nonetheless, it’s a very exciting and good experience for both of us. =)