College
After working 3 – 4 jobs, even one overseas in Vietnam, I went back to college for programming at my hometown college in Oshawa.
I took 2 courses my first semester.
It was hard.
But college was different from university.
It was laid back. No one was really competing and no one was trying 200%-300%.
I was 33 at that time. I accumulated a lot of knowledge over the years and did OK. I was old.
I started in September 2017 and then finished in April 2023 for the 2-year diploma for computer programming.
I did a few detours. My boss at the computer store AMLCSL.com (Al Michael Lane) told me and pushed me to do a thinking brainy job like coding. I just wanted to fix computers at the time and open my own computer repair store.
I even went to Vietnam thinking about living there opening a computer store and possibly learn programming on the side slowly to fulfil my programming passion.
Also a detour in September 2019 doing practical nursing in the city of Scarborough.
It was during the pandemic I made the change and also I wanted to do my dream and finish the computer programming diploma I started in 2017.
During school from May 2020 to April 2023, I did quite a bit of growing things. I worked with my friend Ben Cybulski, brother in-law Simon Fisher, and Dmitry Nefedov, brother William Nguyen, cousins An Nguyen and An Loc. I also socialized a lot with people. Also importantly people from my same background to help me have that cultural basis to grow and reflect from. Many people from the Vietnamese background who were determined and smart.
I created things that I wanted and developed group tools with my friends. That is where I really learned. School work in college wasn’t enough to do the tests and assignments.
At this point in my life, I had things I wanted to develop and do and that helped me finish college.
My niche helped me learn programming. I developed tools in tweaking and repairing Microsoft Windows.
My niche was developed during grade school and high school. I just toyed with computers all day and it became something I liked to do. I enjoyed making the computer faster and customizing Windows.
Also when you are old like middle-aged going back to school, young social things don’t matter no more. Things like generalizing, stereotyping and judging people don’t really matter. You can escape the labels and just do your school work and get the skills and paper and get out.
School is mostly about generalizing and putting everything in boxes, but old age is about self-development and what happens outside, outside the school walls and outside, outside institutions.
Young students and people in general, do not really want to deal with you once you are old. People just learn from you.
When you are old and back at school, you are too old to deal with “young” social problems. You are passed that and grow thinking about mature things. You need to grow or else you are kept back having a mindset of the teenager.