I guess I'm probably writing this because I feel really energized after a two and a half hour nap in the afternoon.

I'm that kind of person who thinks that "it never rains but it pours" is a classic line. True to the max, this phrase usually reflects the life of people. It, most of the time, caught us in the most unexpected moment.

Not that I've actually walked till the end of this road where I've felt hopeless and doubtful of things around me. It is just probably all due to my sceptical personality that I felt that most people in this world did things with a motive and a goal in mind - things definitely do not come free.

The term "pocket money" has been erased from my dictionary since long ago where my parents thought that I could more of less financially support myself with my PC shows salaries. What I received from them was probably money to buy my concession pass every month back then. The glamorous spending that I get to enjoy was out of my own pocket, at the expense of packed lunchboxes to school almost everyday for the passed two years.

Looking back to my graduation after A's, I can still remember that it was the very next morning after graduation night that I started my very first job that does not require me to touch a computer. It never occurred to me that I would actually start to do teaching, and even till now I'm giving tuition, enjoying both the time and the money from it. I've always thought that during my 8 month long holiday, I'll most likely to be stuck with some admin temp jobs or going back to my old line but things actually took a change.

I guess when my peers are enjoying their time after exams, probably watching a movie with a student price on weekdays, I am in a classrooms - facing primary school students from a whole new age (almost alienic) and trying to tackle them. My satisfaction comes only at the end of the month when I see the pay check and now, when I visit my students - their happy faces remembering who I am.

I am, to some extent, stingy. As it was a known fact to me that money don't come easy. I slogged for 10 hours a day, sometimes more due to my tuition sessions to deserve what I am paid with. Maybe I can be called obsessed about my job back then when I actually lost touch with my social circle. So much that I can be at a lost when they strike me with conversation that I can't exactly respond to. Time passed so quickly - weeks after weeks - that it did not occur to me for how long I have not met my friends or how long I've not watched a movie in the cinema . I think the last movie I've watched was Valentine's Day in end-February.

I am very contented with what I am given - the opportunity and the support from my family today. I had never thought that there would be anyone who would tell me that they want to support me financially in my education. I would honestly say that I felt guilty for not being able to get into a local university and it had to cost my parents a bomb - probably not a huge sum to others but it is to me - to study in Curtin. Since two weeks ago when my income officially stops, I had to limit my spending to the minimum because all I'm relying on financially now is my tuition fees.

I did not dare to open my mouth to ask from money as I do feel bad for making them fork out money to pay my expensive school fees. They, too, never ask whether am I having enough to spend (especially after deduction of the hefty transport fees that easily adds up to $150 a month) and never offer to give. I know it is tougher on my Dad financially after my Mum stopped working to take care of the baby. I also don't want to see him work that extra bit, tiring himself out just to give me a share of money every month.

My schedule is tightly packed for the entire week because besides going to class and studying, I had to earn money to support myself financially, not because I want that extra cash to splurge or spend but its because that is all I have.

It was till last week when my brother told me that despite my age, I've been so matured that I am now seeing things from a whole different light. The issues that I talked to and discussed with my family is probably different from what you tell your dad and mom. I had to admit that the environment I've grown up with is just different. I don't have a playmate in the playground other than my grandfather when I was young. Probably I don't really have much of a childhood because, even before I could realised, it was all over. I felt like I've really grown up.

To be completely truthful, I never thought that there is someone out there who is kind and helpful enough to offer me pocket money of $XXX every month until yesterday when he shoved that white envelope in my direction and tells me to study hard. I think I was more to taken aback than touched by that gesture, and to know that it was not only him but there are others who are there willing to support me financially as well.

The thing that is similar about me and my brother is that we know that we had to put in our all in this degree thing because we are not only studying for ourselves. We are studying with the burden - the expectation of the family. It is almost like an investment, like that you have to tell people that you're worth it.

I have to say that it is complicated in my family. It is not the nucleated kind but the big family with all its branches and extensions. I would say that it is a very unique relationship that bond us altogether. There is a very special blood that runs in us, that is why no matter what happens, my family is always the first in my heart.