Searching For My Academic Sanctuary Part 1 -HELP and Sunway

Wahaha. What a weird title. I guess it should just be a simple:

COLLEGE VISITS

Something like that. xD

Well anyway. Since I was already at KL, I figured that I might as well pay a visit to those colleges that I am interested in, notably HELP, Taylor's and Sunway. I did consider MCKL, but then someone from the Petronas interview told me that there are many part-time lecturers there (valid since he's studying there) and I've also heard that before, plus my uncle didn't have time to bring me there, so I chose only to go visit three colleges (one for each day, in fact).

Day 1 (Sunday): This is the day after the Petronas interview. JM and YP were having their own interviews today, so I had nothing to do 'cause mine's already over. Mom came down by bus on Saturday evening, so today we visited HELP in the afternoon.

We only went to the main campus because the one over at Wisma HELP wasn't really open on Sundays. HELP main campus is sort of inside, you have to go underground and then go up to the ground floor to reach it. There isn't a main door, I don't know why. Finding it was kind of hard, LOL. It was tucked away at an obscure corner. I can understand why many people said the main campus sucks. Environment-wise, well not impressive at all. It's like in an office building, without an actual college area/ a feel of college. It felt business-like.

I think the environment over at Wisma HELP (some distance away) where they conduct the A-Levels classes will be better. I considered HELP at first because it has all the subject choices I want, even History (something that is SO rare seriously). And the classes are very flexible, you can choose anything as long as they are not on the same row (else they'll crash). For Taylor's they already have subject packages which you have to take up. HELP's subject combinations are definitely much more flexible.

Something else that I didn't like about HELP: Bursary students are given accommodation at HELP Residence, which is a twin-sharing room at a hostel. Well, accommodation-wise I must say that its competitors are offering much better places to stay. But the main thing is, we have to walk from the hostel to the main campus (about 3mins walk away), then take shuttle bus from there to Wisma HELP to attend classes. Back and forth. Everyday. OMG. That's the biggest problem here >>> convenience.

Don't get me wrong, I still like HELP for its awesome subject flexibility and I've heard the classes are really much more flexible than Taylor's and such. Plus they have a lot of successful students who went to top unis all over the world, and for Edexcel A-Levels I think HELP is the pioneer college in Malaysia offering it. By the way it's the final year they are conducting Edexcel (switching fully to CAL next year), so people who want very much to do A-Levels the Edexcel way should seriously consider HELP, as they're very pro in that particular system. Of course there's always MCKL for Edexcel, if you don't mind the rules and dress code and stuff. :)

But then. Convenience is an issue for me.
At night YP and JM went out to dinner with me. We ate at Fish & Co, where I had salmon ;).

Day 2 (Monday): JM and YP were going home today. We went to visit Sunway together. :) My uncle dropped us at the college (tried to find the college because we didn't know it's university+college+international school all in one =.=)

But then there were those signs once inside the compound with directions, so it was all right. :) So first of all we visited the office, where we sat through an explanation of the A-Levels (of which I already knew). Then we took the loooooong canopy walk from the college to Sunway Monash Residence, the accommodation for Bursary students. It was a very long walk, to be honest. 15 minutes and not yet including time spent going through the Monash University to get to the Residence. I think we spent more than 20 minutes. There are shuttle buses in the morning and at night, but then it would be hell if I were to forget something and left it in my room. =.=

Canopy walk was okay, there are guards stationed along the walk so safety is taken care of. And the room is awesome, it's like a hotel room omg. :D There's a flat-screen TV and a mini fridge in every room, with air-conditioner usage, and it's a SINGLE room. There are 8 rooms in a unit, so 8 people will be sharing one unit, but then it won't feel crowded because the layout is specially built as a hostel style. The unit is large. :) And they have such amazing bathrooms. <3

Convenience is still an issue for me here. Distance between college and accommodation is waaaaay too far. Plus the ultimate: they don't offer the subjects I want for A-Levels. :( I am looking at Humanities subs, and all they're offering are Maths, Econs, Law, Accounting, Business and Psychology. Out of all of them, only Maths and Econs are strong subjects. The rest are weak, as in not so respected in the eyes of Ivy League/Russell Group unis, except maybe Psychology which is partially strong. But then, I need at least three really strong subs to even be considered an offer. And they couldn't let me pick Sciences like Biology. :( So...

Afterward we took another canopy walk to Sunway Pyramid. Another seriously loooong walk, past Sunway Lagoon. >.<
I'll become a skeleton soon. Lol.
Had lunch at Pyramid and then sent YP and JM on their way home. ;)

Will be posting up Day 3 (Taylor's college visit) in Part 2.
Stay tuned,