It all begin when the notices were up and people started talking about it. There were certain steps you had to follow throughout the election. I got selected as a candidate to represent my classmates, E1P3 and mentor-mentee group 11. I didn't mind being a candidate, I thought that it will be real fun campaigning, putting up posters and presenting your manifestos. I thought that it will be great experience and well, no harm running for student council.
On Monday (25/06/2012), we had a candidate's meeting at one of the meeting rooms. The meeting room was super class, super cool and super awesome! Other candidates from TIKL were Izwan, Syed and Halim. During the meeting, they just rambled on what we had to do and so on. We had to come out with a poster and put it up around the college, it wasn't compulsory though. In the end, many of them didn't have a poster.
P/s: My awesome RM 50 leather bag broke while I was on my way to the meeting :/
I was kinda into this election thing. I was thinking, since I already am a candidate, I should work hard and try my luck. That night, I stayed up to do my co-curriculum work before starting off my poster. It was tough deciding what photo to use, since I only have Facebook pictures to choose from. In the end, I decided on the photo captured by Azzam Azhar, when we were on a school trip last year. I did my poster in my neighbor's room. Another two of them were doing theirs, Risa and Ayu.
When Risa was done with hers, it was like WOAH! Mind blowing. Her poster was like perfect. It made mine look shallow, low class and unattractive. HAHA! Who cares? The next day, I went to the HEP to print my poster. It turned out BAD. The alignment was all out. Plus, I missed a few items on the poster, i.e: college's logo and name, my course etc. Hence, I have to make amendments, while many others have hung up their posters. For this election, printing service, photostat service and strings are provided free!
I start amending my poster in the afternoon. Fear of the alignments going wrong again, I printed one copy on Ainaa's (my super nice classmate) printer first. It turned out nice I guess :P Tuesday night, I did Izwan's poster too. Since he loaned me his laptop to do my assignments, to update my blog, to facebook, it's time for me to do something back :) His poster was real easy to do. I just used my finished poster, changed the photo, then change a little of the wordings and all and there you get another poster :P
Turns out that, I was the only one using full body picture. HEHE. So the Electric candidates were to present their manifestos on Wednesday night together with the Mechanical candidates. The Civil candidates had done it the previous night. Before going on stage, I practiced in my room with the help of my roommates, I think I sounded pretty well and confident. In a twist of fate, it turned out the opposite. I didn't sound like how I wanted to sound. HAHA! At least I think I got my message across, hopefully.
Many of my friends described my speech as 'sempoi' or 'santai'. God knows what that means. HEHE. Putting up posters was a little hassle. Almost 80 % of the candidates put up their posters alone. Well as for me, I decided to put it up with other candidates, Haziq and Izwan. Hoping that alternate posters won't look so boring, we stapled our hearts out (exaggerating), paper after paper. But in reality, we only put up our posters in a few places, strategic ones:
- Ko-op
- Cafe
- English Zone
- Outside guy's hostel
- Masjid
- Hostel notice boards
Thursday was the voting day. It was kinda exciting. We had to go to classes as usual though. When it was time to vote, I voted too! Only students from Electric course could vote for Electric candidates. Oh well. There were 9 candidates for Electric course and 6 were to be selected. Not much of a tough fight. I voted for those that in the end got selected too. If you know what I mean. After voting, I went back to my room and have that long awaited nap after all those sleepless nights.
The results were to be announced that night itself. Honestly, I wanted people to vote for be because I'm capable of this role, not because I'm that Chinese in KMTPh. First, they called up all the Electric candidates. The 1st candidate got about 30 + votes. The 2nd candidate got about 50 + votes. I am the 3rd candidate. I was kinda nervous when they were about to announce my number of votes, fearing that it might be lower than the 1st and 2nd candidate. Guess what? I got 72 votes man! Highest votes for Electric course :D I was so happy for myself. HEHE.
Izwan got 2nd highest votes for Electric course, 67 votes! To sum up this whole event, there were many issues that came to light. For one, popularity mattered a lot. Many candidates who worked hard producing a poster, who wanted to be part of the student council didn't make it. However, some popular ones, made it without much sweat. First impressions were also crucial in these kinda events. Make the first wrong move then KAPUTT! There are also a few others that need not be known. Lets just let bygones be bygones.
I'll post a picture of my poster soon...
Let's keep it simple. Tell me what you want and I will fight for it.
Grey Matter shuts down here :)
