dare to dream

because you never know what your future holds ...

wow! i've just realized that exactly a year ago, on saturday 14 jan 2006, i did one of the best or the most stupid decisions in my life. on that day i applied for the university of edinburgh (and the uni of glasgow as well). it was such a spontaneous decision! in the morning that day i said to myself "i wish i could study somewhere abroad" and in the evening i sent my application to ucas (universities and colleges admission services) in the uk. it was more for fun, i treated it rather as a joke. i was like: "i don't lose anything by applying [oh, well, forget about £15 application fee]. why shouldn't i give it a try? i can do it and will see what happens next." why did i choose scotland? i have no idea. simply, it was a random choice. why didn't i apply anywhere else, even though i could apply for 6 universities in the uk? no idea, either. anyway, what happened next (to my very big surprise!) was that early in march i received "successful - conditional" offers from both universities. conditional meant that the offers were subject to passing an additional english language exam (ielts), which i took in june receiving 7.5 out of 9.0 (my condition was 6.5). before making any further decisions, i went to edinburgh in march 2006 to attend the university open days. i remember that while i was trying to get to the uni central area i met an american woman on a bus. she took a seat next to me and we started talking. she said she had spent her summer holidays in edinburgh 6 years ago. she loved the city so much that without any hesitation she had left california and moved to scotland. also, she said to me "if you do the same, you won't regret. i can promise it. you'll love the city as i do." and that was a moment when i realized i wanted to study in edinburgh. i whispered: "if i ever come here again, i wanna come here as a student of the edinburgh university". what can i say... my dream came true and it still lives on.