“Time flies when you have fun!”
I’ve heard this phrase often growing up, and while the journey up until this point of my last year of my 20s hasn’t been the smoothest, it’s been fast moving ever since I’ve started taking courses at Oregon State University (OSU) in the Winter of 2021.
Now that I’ve started the (hopefully) last term at OSU, I reflect back to my childhood when I first touched my late father’s computer at his work back in the late 1990s.
The 1990s – The Introduction
I don’t have great recollection of all the details from that time, but I still vaguely remember my father showing me how to draw flowers and animals on Microsoft Paint using the mouse, shooting monsters on Doom (which my mother was not a huge fan of him showing me), and simply clicking around different features of the computer back then. This was a big step for me – it introduced my young self to technology, and its endless potential. I was hooked.
Early 2000s – Living the Generation
From then on, I continued to be fascinated by computers, games, and gadgets. I saved money to buy the latest console from Nintendo, drew digital drawings using Microsoft Paint, and eventually created my first website in GeoCities.
Then in middle school, I created a website from scratch using HTML through a class and presented it at a local Apple store. I was proud of my creation, although my parents at the time were a little embarrassed by my geekiness. Classic Japanese parents.
Late 2000s to 2010s – Transition
Then, towards high school while I continued to play MMO games on my PC, it was time to decide on my first major in college; however, Computer Science was not my choice.
You might wonder, why? Why did I decide not to pursue at least something like Game Design or some computer related degree, based on the stories told so far?
I hit a point where my interests were pointed at painting with traditional medium (like oil paints) and I simply enjoyed doing regular coursework. Computer was more of a hobby at the time, not something I wanted to pursue in career.
Hence, I went into University of California, Santa Cruz, first pursuing Theater Arts Design and eventually graduated with a degree in Business Management Economics (BME). This transition is a story for another time.
Late 2010s to 2020 – College to Working in Silicon Valley
And you might be wondering, so how did you go full circle and end up today at my last stretch in my Computer Science degree?
After graduating from UC Santa Cruz with a not-so-useful BME degree, I ended up in a contractor work at Google, working closely with engineers for localization. As I worked more closely with tech people, this was the point where I started to wonder:
“Wait a minute… Wasn’t this the people, topics, and knowledge that I was actually interested in?”
Turns out, it was. After working at Google for a little more than a year, I applied and became a Knowledge Engineer at Amazon.
I was able to work on creating new features for Amazon Alexa, and that was the point I confirmed I really enjoyed creating something from scratch, much like I enjoyed painting artwork in high school.
However, after 2 years of working there, a company re-organization happened and I lost my job, and that happened to coincide with the COVID-19 pandemic that severely impacted the job market in 2020, leading me to an year of self-reflection.
2020 – The Year of Reflection
The year of 2020 was tough, but was a year that I learned more about myself and interest. I decided to code once again, after multiple months of failed attempt at landing on jobs.
I revived my limited memory of HTML from my middle school and Java from that one class I took in college, and proceeded to learn Python, JavaScript, HTML, CSS, SQL, etc. through online courses like The Odin Project and freeCodeCamp.
Then, towards the latter half of 2020, I learned about OSU’s post-bacc program. I was already late for Fall 2020 application, so I rushed to apply for Winter 2021.
I got accepted, and fortunately or not, I also got accepted for a contract role for Meta as a TPM role. Though I was not expecting to study and work at the same time initially, I decided to try out the “working full time and pursuing a 2nd degree” route.
And Now
Here I am today, spending my daytime working as a TPM team lead and nighttime studying in my last term in OSU. It’s been a busy year and three quarters, but I’m seeing the light at the tunnel.
I am already looking towards 2023 as a year to advance my career, shifting my gear from a engineering coordination/management role to actual engineering role, which I haven’t had a chance to prepare myself quite yet, but is excited of!
I also just went back to Japan seeing my family for the past 2 weeks, and feel rejuvenated. I feel ready to tackle my last term.
For those who happened to come across this post and taken the time to read, thank you! If you are fellow student like myself, I wish you the best of luck in your journey.
I don’t think the next post will be as long as this one, but until next time!
– Fusako
