A Bittersweet Goodbye, A Hopeful Beginning

Finishing something big brings a strange kind of tiredness. You are relieved, proud and happy, but you can also feel an entire chapter closing while you are still standing inside it.

Last week, I finally graduated from Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

I had lived in Shanghai long enough for it to stop feeling like a destination and start feeling like home. Graduation brought pride, relief and joy, but also an early nostalgia. Being an international student often meant carrying two lives at once: the one I was building in China and the one I had left behind in Malaysia.

Some semesters were harder than I usually admitted. Reaching the end made me realise how much of that weight I had been carrying quietly.

The Week Everything Stopped

My final year was a blur of back-to-back internships and deadlines. Time became something I managed instead of something I experienced.

For graduation week, I took a full week away from work and gave it to my family. It felt almost rebellious to stop, but it was exactly what I needed.

My family did not see a GPA or a list of internships. They saw the kid who left home years ago and returned a little different. Having a whole unhurried week with them felt like the real graduation gift.

The Goodbyes Nobody Warns You About

I also met many of my Malaysian friends. We laughed, remembered old stories and took too many photos. Underneath it all was something nobody wanted to say: for some of us, this might have been the last time together in the same place.

Graduation gathers everyone for one final moment and then sends them across countries, industries and time zones. Friendships can fade without anyone doing anything wrong. Goodbyes in your twenties rarely announce themselves as final. They usually sound like “see you soon.”

If we knew which goodbye was the last one, we'd never be able to say it.

What Shanghai Gave Me

These years were shaped by thousands of small things: professors who challenged me, classmates who carried me through deadlines, strangers who were patient with my Chinese and a city that always moved faster than I did.

I arrived as a student and left shaped by late nights, private failures and people whose names will never appear on my diploma. Without them, I would not be this version of myself.

The Next Chapter

Here's the news I've been holding onto: I converted my internship into a full-time offer. I'll be staying with the company, working in AI.

The decision was not easy. I also had offers from universities I once dreamed about attending. Turning them down felt strange, and occasionally a little absurd.

But AI was moving quickly, and I wanted to learn from the work itself. I would rather help build at the frontier than study it from a distance. There would still be time for more school. This particular moment might not wait.

It was a bet, but it was my bet.

The Unglamorous Truth

Of course, new chapters don't begin with montages. They begin with paperwork.

The following weeks were filled with visa applications, apartment viewings, deposits, contracts and administrative errands. None of it looked exciting.

Still, every form and apartment visit belonged to a life I had chosen, in a field I genuinely wanted to work in. The hassle was not separate from the next chapter. It was the entry fee.

Closing (For Now)

I was sad to leave because the chapter had been good. The people, lessons, city and person I had become were proof that the time was well spent.

To everyone who was part of it: thank you. You know who you are.

The chapter is closing. The next one is already asking for my signature on a dozen documents.

I can't wait.

To new beginnings — and to the people who made the old ones worth ending well.