How my resolve was hardened through failure

Have you ever been totally and completely shut down after putting everything you had into one goal? I was in LA having dinner at a Moroccan restaurant, Babouch, spending my last twenty dollars. I was broke, disappointed, tired, and not looking forward to the six hour drive home.

I was a ronin.

Allow me to explain. In Japan, there is a culture centered around college entrance exams. The more prestigious the college, the more difficult the exams are. Those who are accepted have a downhill ride to graduating and the promise of a good career, depending on how good the college they went to is. Those who do not pass, however, are labeled as a ronin. In my case, I was in LA taking the exam for a scholarship called the monbukagakusho (”moan-boo-show” for short). Being accepted into this scholarship would mean the Japanese government would pay to fly you to Japan, place you into a school to teach you Japanese, then later place you into a college (depending on your area of study), pay for your tuition, and pay you a generous amount of money each month to live on.

Now, you want to know how many other people applied for the undergraduate scholarship this year? Two. This is the story of my experience in LA, and how being rejected from the scholarship hardened my resolve.

The setup

I had first heard of the opportunity through a friend who had previously applied. After doing extensive research (reading the instructions), I decided that in addition to filling out the application (which included such questions as, “Where did you go to preschool?” and “What is your level of French?”) I needed a certificate of good health, chest xray, and a recommendation letter.

I had actually finished everything early. The application and documents were published on the consulate website in early April, and I had them finished before May. What almost got me, however, was the recommendation letter. You see, they specifically wanted a letter from an adviser or principal from the school. I hadn’t realized this until a week before it was due. It was Monday and the documents had to be at the Japanese consulate in LA by the very next Monday.

I scrambled down to the college only to find that the advisers do not give out recommendation letters as a policy. So I called the consulate and told them this. Their solution was to get a letter from a teacher of mine. Now, this may seem like a good idea. But have you ever tried to contact a teacher during the Summer? Not possible. I tried teacher after teacher, but was unable to contact any of them. It was now Tuesday.

Panic.

On Wednesday I caught a break when I realized that one of my former teachers was an independent singing teacher, surely I could get reliable contact information by searching for her online. Success. I wrote up detailed instructions and dropped off the necessary documents for completion on the same day; then I waited.

After two and a half painstaking days I get the letter back at noon on Friday. Now, do you want to know how much it cost me to ensure that it arrived the very next Monday with FedEx? No, you don’t.

Anyway, later that week I get an email telling me that my application was “among those that passed the initial screening”. Oh joy. The deal was, I had to be there on the 18th (I got the email on the 10th) to take the exam, then based on my test results I would be called back for an interview. There would be a Japanese test, an English test, and a Math test. Mind you, the information packet told us that no Japanese skill was necessary. Even so, I knew quite a bit of Japanese. Last year’s test was also available online and it was easy.

At this point I started looking for hotels. I had found a nice, old hotel named “The Cecil”. It was awesome, and within walking distance of consulate. Also in my research I discovered that there is a Little Tokyo, which was also in walking distance, and a Koreatown. In addition to all of this, my favorite restaurant in the whole world, Babouch, was only half an hour away. I could make a fun trip out of this.

At the consulate

Fast forward to when I’m in LA. It’s the morning of the 18th and I’ve got an hour to find some breakfast and get to the consulate. I pay for the second day of parking (making it a total of $32 spent on parking so far) and head out walking in the direction of the consulate. If you’ve never walked around in downtown LA, I can tell you from personal experience that it’s a total shit hole. I passed at least two men who pissed in the sidewalk, another two who asked me for money, and heard sirens go off every ten minutes. I went into the Little Tokyo library later and overheard one guy say to another, “I’m gonna cut him”, no joke.

After what should have been a ten minute walk turns into a fifty minute walk, I arrive at a large, towering building with just enough time to spare. Inside there are suits who block you from getting to the elevator. I’m told to check into the front desk.

Once I’ve done this, I get into the elevator and head all the way up to the 17th floor. When the doors open I’m greeted with a sign that says “Japanese consulate”. I know I’m in the right place, and I’m excited. I go up to the guard, go through the metal detector, and enter a strange room. It reminds me of an airport, with the lined up uncomfortable seats. Across from the seats is a line of windows where people were talking in Japanese to each other about visas and passports and such, with the window between them much like buying tickets at a movie theater. Now I was really excited. I walk toward the library.

Inside I count twelve other people. I’m so distracted that I almost fail to notice the cute Japanese woman standing to the side, almost. I walk up to her and say “Hi”, with a smile. She asks me my name and I tell her, “Alex Elkholy”. She gives me a visitor sticker to put on my shirt. I find out that she’s the coordinator for the scholarship.

A minute later we all follow her to a conference room at the other side of the embassy. Inside, all the research students and graduate students are told to site in a desk in the middle, and the undergraduates to sit to the side. While everybody sits at the middle desk, I meet the only other two undergrads. There’s a guy and a girl.

After we’re seated, a man named Mr. Karakawa comes in and explains to us how it’s all going to go down. The graduates/research students have to take the Japanese test and have the option to take an English test. Us undergraduates don’t have the same choice, in addition to taking the Japanese and English test, we also have to take a Mathematics test, with an hour for each.

We start the Japanese test, and it’s tough. The goal is to pick the sentences that fits best within the context of the sentence. I’ve gotten to the point where I’m fairly confident reading with a dictionary, and it’s still tough. There were 18 questions. Right afterwards we take the English test, and it’s easy. It’s the same goal as the Japanese test, except more in depth.

It’s now eleven o’clock. The graduates and research students are told they can leave to await an email, while the undergraduates are told to come back in two hours for the final Mathematics test. So the other undergraduate girl and I go out for some lunch. We find some corner shop, eat something, explore the area, joke about how we’ll throw each other off a building for one of the scholarship spots, etc. But it was getting close to being time to head back and I was getting curious. Were we competing for a specific number of slots? If so, how many would they allow to go? What I was hoping for was that they’d pick the people with the highest test scores (of which I was positive I had done so far, of the three of us).

The math test.

We get back to the consulate and Mr. Karakawa brings us to a different room. He hands out the packets and I decide to ask him,

“Mr Karakawa, are we competing for a limited number of spots?”.

“There isn’t a limit, we can send as many as we want. But you have to reach a high enough test score in to be considered.”

“Really?

“Yes. In the past few years we haven’t had anybody from the entire country get a high enough score.”

I’m left with that thought as I open the Math test booklet. I’m blinded by that thought as I realize I can’t even guess at a single question in the entire test. The questions are all calculus, and I don’t know calculus. The first question told me things like,

“A + B = x and AB^2 + BC^2 = y, if this quadratic function (AB^2 + B^ = C) has the value of 2 for B…”

I didn’t even know what a Quadratic function is, man. I turned in my answer sheet, blank, and left the consulate.

Later, that night…

They had told me earlier that they would call me around 5pm on the same day to tell me if I’d be called back for an interview on the next day. I’m back at the hotel when I get the call. She tells me that, unfortunately, that I’m not going to be called back to an interview. Using full on passive voice even, so as to deflect blame.

Oh well.

I was hungry and I decided to get some food. I had planned to go to this restaurant, Babouch, some time on my trip and it looked like I wasn’t going to be staying another night. So I went, sat down at the table, and ordered. It was then that I had realized where I was: broke, spending all of my money chasing my one goal. I really didn’t have any idea what I should do now. Finish college? Get a job? No clue?

Yep, that’s where I was. I knew what it meant to go on without a goal. If I had allowed myself to remain lost, then I would slip into mediocrity. The only thing I would accomplish would be that which I was told to do by others. It would mean a total loss of any sense of self. I knew at that point that I had to decide on something to work toward. There has to be something driving me forward.

I decided to try again next year. I decided that by next year, my Japanese ability is going to be good enough to cut through that test like a twig and my Math ability would be good enough to ace their test without any problems. It was here that I had hardened my resolve.

I’ve come to understand that there is a difference between setting a goal, and setting a goal for a purpose. I had these goals before, get better at math, get better at Japanese, learn more about X, etc. I was even pursuing them, for the most part. But this sort of goal only takes you half way there. Before this scholarship I had been skipping on my Japanese learning, I wasn’t doing especially well in my Math studies.

I realized that having a goal only gives you the ambition, the purpose of the goal is what gives you resolve.

My goal is to get better at Japanese, it is tempered with the resolve gained from knowing I will be tested on it in a year. When I had reached home, my first task was to put together something to organize and keep track of my goals. I came up with this:

This little device is a three ring binder that has a sheet listing my goals, my two stickers given at the embassy (to remind me of what it was like being there), tabs for all the projects that warrant having them. Since then this binder has become the center for everything I do. I consult and use it daily. On the goal sheet I have two lists, my goals and my projects. My goals are for long term, what I hope to eventually accomplish. My projects are the short term tasks to bring me toward my goals.

Epilogue

So I write this now after just having learned all about Quadratic Functions. Thinking back, I would say that I’m happy I went and tried. Sometimes it takes something big to whip you into shape, and for me that was definitely what was needed. Because I went to the embassy, because I failed, it made my goal something tangible. It made my resolve as strong as steel.

I hope other people can learn from my experience here and apply it to their own lives. Learn to find some purpose for your goal, make it as real as possible. As long as you have those, you’re life will be that much better.