I know, but I guess it gives an equally fair chance for all eligible countries. If certain countries had a high admission quota, I suspect that many applicants would try and adopt a second citizenship to double their chances of winning, or whatever illicit method they can think of. I'm not at all surprised by the fact that Iranians are flocking to the Land of the Infidels, because from my experiences of meeting all sorts of people from all over the world.. whatever you think you know about them, throw it out of the window right now. For example, I'm Malay, and although I'm afforded with various opportunities, 'shortcuts' and whatnot in Malaysia, I don't plan on going back to settle down. That surprised you? But let's stay on track, this is EE, not RWI. xD

I'm in San Antonio but every weekend I go back home in Houston. What sort of experiences do you want to know?

And conservativeness is well and alive here, but in the Southern parts of Texas, Democratic influences are a majority, since, you know, it being that close to the Mexican border, and the population demographics that live in that area.. there is a high job growth here in Texas due to the O&G industry and the recent tech boom in the DFW area. Honestly, as a student, I preferred the job market in Southern California, there were a lot of big companies, startups, and nonprofits that I wanted to intern in but I never had the time to. Here in Gulf Coast, it's pretty much all engineering stuff.

I agree on the corn part. As I drove across the Midwest, I remember particularly hating Nebraska because of the straight-down roads that offered nothing but endless fields of corn, as far as the eye can see. It also reminded me of 'Children of the Corn', and an English Literature class I once took that was taught by a Cornhusker. He forced us to read Nebraska-related titles such as Willa Cather's "O Pioneers!". Needless to say, I have something against Nebraska.. hahah. I liked Iowa, though.

A&M was my first choice. I completed my AA degree of 2 years at a community college earlier this year (Spring '14) and applied to be an Aggie. However, they were only admitting students for the Spring '15 intake. This was a mistake on my part for not being thorough. So the law dictates that if you aren't attending school full-time for one semester or longer, you have to return to your home country. I can't do this because my whole family just moved to Houston in summer! With that in mind, I winged it and applied to UT San Antonio. I would've gone to UT Austin if the tuition costs weren't so high.. so here I am in UTSA, knocking a few more classes out of the way for half the price that I would pay in UT Austin until I could be in A&M. If that fails, I guess I'll just jump over to UT Austin - the Jackson School of Geosciences is pretty good.

This post has been edited by latias93: Oct 8 2014, 11:25 PM

Haha I have a coworker who is also a good friend outside work, and he's from Iowa. Attended University of Iowa for grad school, and identifies as a Hawkeye. We give him way too much shit about it.

So you're an up-and-coming Aggie/Longhorn huh? Nice. I'm a Boilermaker.

oh god latias93, you taking geology also?! welcome my fellow rock specialist... I applied to A&M as well... but dont know my chance of transferring into spring 2015. My gpa is 3.54 but done in a college ADP back in Malaysia.

Yes, I'm a future Aggie/Longhorn! I'd better make up my mind fast about it though, I've got friends on both sides who are ready to pounce on me once I defect to the other.. I'm not sure if Boilermakers and Hoosiers practice this kind of rivalry. Do they? haha

Yup, Geology/Environmental Science! GPA 3.54 should be good enough, don't worry. What other schools did you apply to?

Taylor's College for my A levels...my a levels was a less than stellar one... i had personal problems during my A Levels...to save money i took ADP after my A Levels.

Hey did you do math in A Levels? Is it hard? If yes, how hard is it?

Wow, you're Malay! Makes we want to know more! How do you feel being there in the US? Do you face discrimination? How do you like life there? Is the job market thriving? What does the San Antonio look like? Houston to my eyes is one huge city made up of endless stretches of suburbs, but please do elaborate!

Why don't you plan to come back here? Is it because there are simply more opportunities there?

Well typically, big cities have a lot of fortune 500 companies, I forgot the exact number, but I think LA and DFW have about the same amount of fortune 500 companies. Houston has a lot of them too, but it has more concentration in energy, I mean for gods sake, they have a place called the Houston Energy Corridor :OOOOO

This post has been edited by MisterLee: Oct 9 2014, 10:10 PM

Oh they do. During the Bucket game, we had some IU students take pictures with our Neil Armstrong statue and the comments were "THAT'S THE CLOSEST YOU'LL EVER BE TO AN ENGINEER!".

So yeah, it's an intense rivalry.

Today, I learned that Neil Armstrong was a Boilermarker haha. And as for the school rivalry - that's intense, but I've seen worse. Back in SoCal, the USC Trojans/UCLA Bruins rivalry certainly puts other schools to shame. I've seen Bruins hire private helicopters just so they could perform 'aerial attacks' by dumping yellow and blue paint over the Trojan statue. That definitely takes it to the next level. It certainly seems fun to be part of a big family and subculture associated with school teams - something I have yet to attain.

First and last men on the moon were Boilermakers, b****es!! School pride! XD

That is a LOT of questions.. damn, I'm not sure how to answer all of it. Haha. I'll try. I love being in (some parts of) the US! I've never faced discrimination before, a couple of incidents did come close, though. You can just look up how those cities look like on Google, but San Antonio has a beautiful historical downtown river walk and there's a couple of nice spots in Houston. But otherwise, they're just plain suburbs - boring, grid-like and consistent. Just like Damansara/PJ, I guess. There are a million reasons, big and small; on why I don't want to return to Malaysia, but I can go on and on about it that will span the length of several mamak hangout sessions. Most of them are purely materialistic and superficial, and this includes but are not limited to: the ability to own a bunch of kickass cars and such low prices, the fact that I have 2-day free Amazon Prime shipping, Netflix, cheap stuff, Netflix, beautiful national parks, great food, the Second Amendment, and did I mention Netflix?

If you really want to know, we can chat privately about the other reasons, because I don't want to spew out too much irrelevant stuff in an Education Essentials subforum.

Yup, Houston is definitely the mecca of the energy industry here in the Western hemisphere. My dad's here, in the oil and gas industry. So is my aunt, who lives a mile away from our house. I've met a Malaysian girl who's also working in the oil and gas industry here. And I found out that a Malaysian Boilermaker I met earlier this year at the Malaysian Midwest Games at IUB lived in Houston up until recently, as his mother was working in, you guessed it, the oil and gas industry.

I'm impressed. Best quote I've seen all week, and I've spent hours on Reddit. That's definitely something you can tell people! #BoilerUp

Texas really is about oil and gas, so no surprise there. I loved Houston the one time I visited

Yup houston is the silicon valley of the oil and gas industry.

I know how those cities look like, I mean like, how does it feel like, every city has its own feel. I know that river walk! It's really nice and it looks pretty walkable with a decent amount of retail. I just hate suburbs, they stretch forever and it is the reason why everything in Malaysia is so spread out and you NEED car to get to things.
The car thing I understand very much. Cars are so impossibly cheap there!!! Even luxury cars are less than $100,000 there
I totally understand, they ALWAYS get the coolest new stuff! ALWAYS!

I so totally will

Wow, your father must be really high paid then! So is everyone else you know
By the time I get to San Antonio and Houston, you're gonna be my personal tour guide

aaand this place died again.

I know right =_=
It was fun while it lasted haha
Anything else to talk about though?

You study geology for the love of earth science or you think there where the money is????

p/s...better keep an eye on WTI price. If it goes any lower you can forget the geology job in the coming years

Better keep an eye on WTI price. If it goes any lower there gonna be a bloodbath. where I am at, France's Total and Norway's Statoil have scuttled their projects for the time being. Other companies also reviewing their spending

Haha school pride is the best. It's something every student who goes to the US must experience. Nothing like it in Malaysia, UK or Australia