Hello there my name is Bernadhita Tamara Angelia Wardhana but for your sake you can call me Tamara. My birthday is on September 10th so about 8 days ago I turned 20 years old. I graduated at The Newman School, Boston class of 2018 with an IB Certificates that I cherish dearly because I put my tears and sweats to get that piece of paper. Then, because I developed interest in Fashion during that time I started to applied on short online courses in Parsons and FIDM and then for a year I studied at Milan in Istituto Marangoni majoring in Fashion Business, and the plan was to continue my second year in London to get a bachelor degree but I decided to take a year off to really know if Fashion Business is something that I really want. During my year off I realise that I actually curious and want to learn more about business especially in the finance aspect, so that leads me for applying at UGM's IUP Accounting major.
So, if I am not mistaken, you are the oldest IUP student.
Tamara wrote:
“I decided to take a year off to really know if Fashion Business is something that I really want. During my year off I realise that I actually curious and want to learn more about business especially in the finance aspect, so that leads me for applying at UGM's IUP Accounting major.”
[1] You started this with the past tense: “I decided to take a year off…”. This is fine. I suggest you continue with that. Look at this:
“I DECIDED to take a year off to really know if working in the fashion business WAS something that I really WANTED to do.”
Note some other edits I have made.
[2] The words “Fashion Business” are not capitalized.
[3] We continue the past tense thing… “During my year off, I REALISED that I WAS actually curious and WANTED to learn more about business especially the finance aspect.”
Once again, take note of the other edits I have made.
You wrote:
“I put my tears and sweats to get that piece of paper…”
The expression you are looking for, conventionally, is “blood, sweat and tears”. Note the order of the words. Now, I don’t know whether “blood” fits your story! However, it’s just a figure of speech, so it’s OK. Compare yours to mine and note the one or two other changes I have made:
“I put my blood, sweat and tears into getting that piece of paper…”
Greetings! My name is Sabrina Eunice Susanto, but I assume that would be too much of a mouthful to say at once, so let’s settle with calling me Sabrina or Sabby for short. I was born on the 8th of May in 2002, so that makes me a Taurus (just a fun astrology fact there), and my MBTI personality type is an INTP. I assume I would not be as interesting to read about as I have not travelled nor lived in as many countries as my other classmates have, but I would like to pride myself on having an okay sense of humor. Or, enough that people would still want to be friends with me. What else can I say? I’ve been living in South Tangerang my whole life, after all. I went to elementary and junior high school in an international school, but then transferred to SMA UPH College High School, which resulted in, though not as an extreme transitional period as moving to a whole other country, quite the culture shock for me who had been in the same school previously for about thirteen years or so. I expect moving to Yogyakarta later on would be quite the big deal for me, but I’ll let Miss Corona take the wheel in deciding whether or not I’m ready to go there yet. Oh, I also love reading. Doesn’t necessarily have to be books, but they do have to be interesting. I am currently reading ‘All the Light We Cannot See’ by Anthony Doerr and my favorite book is ‘Aristotle and Dante Discovers the Secrets of the Universe’. Anyway, it was nice to meet you, Sir Adrien, a very entertaining, funny, amazing individual (will you give me extra points for this flattery?), and I hope we can work well later on!
“My name is Sabrina Eunice Susanto, but I assume that would be too much of a mouthful to say at once, so let’s settle with calling me Sabrina or Sabby for short.”
This is a great start and I can only find one small thing to correct!
The words “settle with” mean something else (“I settled with my accusser out of court”).
The preposition you need is “for”; to “settle for” something means ‘accept something less than what you wanted’. You saying this in your opening sentences is mildly humorous, which I think is your intent.
You wrote:
“I expect moving to Yogyakarta later on would be quite the big deal for me, but I’ll let Miss Corona take the wheel in deciding whether or not I’m ready to go there yet.”
Another nice, light-hearted sentence. And here’s me, nitpicking again!
“Moving to Yogyakarta” is not hypothetical or in doubt, so you should use “will” rather than “would”.
Hi everyone. My name is Salmaa Khoirunnisa. You can just call me Salmaa- the second “a” is pretty much silent. I was born in Indonesia, but I have lived abroad since I was young as my dad got a job overseas. Despite living overseas for 10 years, I am still not confident in my language skills as it is not really my passion. On top of that, I was living in Singapore which is known for our broken English. Hence, my language is never my strength. If you were wondering why I chose to go to the university in Indonesia, instead of the universities in Singapore, I will honestly admit that it was because of my family’s financial status. My dad ended his contract with the company he was working for in Singapore and migrated back to Indonesia when I was still pursuing my diploma in Singapore. I was lucky enough to be admitted into the top universities in Singapore, but the school fees were too much, and I felt guilty towards my parents for using a large sum of money for my education. Hence, I choose to follow my dad’s and sister’s footsteps and join the UGM family. To be very honest, I feel quite intimidated to start a new journey in Indonesia as I realized that Indonesians enter universities at a very young age (18 or 19 years old). Whereas in Singapore, it is common for us to start universities when we are 20 years old. Hence, my confidence has been lacking ever since I migrated back to Indonesia. However, I still believe that all education is good no matter where you obtain it from. Thus, I look forward to my new chapter in Yogyakarta surrounded by the UGM family.
“Hence, I choose to follow my dad’s and sister’s footsteps and join the UGM family.”
This sentence came at the end of a long paragraph where you were telling your story, which you did using the past tense. So it was odd to suddenly hear you talk about this choice you made in the present tense; you made that choice in the past, so the final sentence should be in the past tense just like the sentences prior to it.
You wrote:
“To be very honest, I feel quite intimidated to start a new journey in Indonesia as I realized that Indonesians enter universities at a very young age (18 or 19 years old).”
Actually, quite a lot of IUP students are still 17 years old presumably because they went on the so-called fast track when they were at senior high school (have I got this right?).
You wrote:
“Hence, my confidence has been lacking ever since I migrated back to Indonesia.”
It’s not clear why your confidence would be diminished by you being older than many people around you.
Hello everyone my name is Rafie Danishwara, you can call me Rafie i'm part of the International Undergraduate Programme in which i major in the Management. Currently i am 18 and am living in Tangerang in the midst of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Originally me joining UGM was something i have thought as a fluke for i only joined the entrance exam on a whim. The only reason i had joined the entrance exam was because my sister had graduation for UGM the day prior for the entrance exam so therefore my dad had the idea for me to just join the test because it's on the following day. I was suprised because i wasn't ready for it but in the end i suprised myself by being accepted in the first intake for which i also feel it was a fluke or i probably don't deserve it as much as someone who actually prepared for months or weeks prior to the exam. The prospect of moving to Jogja for me is quite interesting for i've been there a couple times and the atmosphere and food is quite to my liking. But living alone is definitely going to be a new challenge. Before UGM i had also plans to apply for Monash but currently the situation is still unclear with them so for the current time i will continue my studies with UGM.
[1] Rafie, you need to always be aware of what tense you are writing in and pay attention to it. You seem to shift between present tense and past tense quite a lot. You even use the past perfect tense – which is good; many writers avoid it because they are unsure exactly when to use it – but you aren’t consistent.
[2] You just capitalize “I” (the pronoun) always, unless it’s a kind of arty affectation in a poem (like HERE https://tinyurl.com/yxmr7r5g for example).
[3] More than 230 words (and eight sentences) and no commas? That is peculiar. If I asked you to use commas in order to make your writing smoother for your readers, where would you insert them? Something to think about. (Edit: wait, no. There is ONE comma. Sorry.)
Hello everyone, my name is Audrey Fikrah Himmah Ramayandi and you can call me Audrey. I'm 17 years old. I was born and raised in Bekasi and I just finished my studies about several months ago at Al-Azhar 4 senior high school. Currently, I’m a student of Gadjah Mada University at Yogyakarta, but because of the pandemic, I have to stayed in Bekasi for the whole semester. I'm actually attending the International Undergraduate Program class at Gadjah Mada University. The reason why I’m joining the International Undergraduate Program is because in the future we’ll be living in a global society and IUP will give me everything in order to survive in that condition not only from knowledge but also from international exposure. There is a double degree program, that program will allow me to achieve a double degree, and also double degree program will allow me to find a suitable job with a better position in some great companies in Indonesia. I am very confident that by becoming an IUP student, I can contribute to the people of Indonesia. I choose Gadjah Mada University because it is located in the best city for learning in Indonesia. my ambition to become an accountant leads me to study accounting major as my whole family worked as an accountant. Before I accepted at Gadjah Mada University, I already accepted at Diponegoro University as an accounting student in the international program. But after several weeks, there is an announcement that I have been accepted as Gadjah Mada University Student. Well, since UGM has the upper hand in the accounting program, therefore I choose Gadjah Mada University as my next step toward the future.
“I just finished my studies about several months ago.”
Both words, “about” and “several”, indicate approximation (meaning you are not trying to be precise). So having them BOTH in your sentence sounds clumsy. Compare my two alternatives to your sentence:
“I just finished my studies several months ago.”
“I just finished my studies about three months ago.”
You wrote:
“The reason why I’m joining the International Undergraduate Program is because in the future we’ll be living in a global society and IUP will give me everything in order to survive in that condition not only from knowledge but also from international exposure.”
This is a fine sentence. However, it would benefit from a few commas. Take a look at my version and pay attention to where I have inserted the aforementioned commas:
“The reason why I’m joining the International Undergraduate Program is because, in the future, we’ll be living in a global society, and IUP will give me everything I need in order to survive in those conditions, not only the necessary knowledge, but also from international exposure.”
Note that I have made one or two other edits too. See if you can spot them and consider why I made those changes.
Note: I think you are overstating what IUP will do for you… it “…will give me everything I need in order to survive in those conditions…”. I don’t think it will give you “everything”, but it will give you a good a start as you could hope for from what is, after all, Indonesia’s No.1 ranked university according to the 2021 QS Rankings… hip hip, hooray!!
Hello Mr Adrian and all of my friends, allow me to present myself before you. My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, usually goes by Ismail, or Mail by friends and parent. I came to this world on 12th of July, 2001 in Harapan Bunda Hospital, east Jakarta city. I am the second child in my family with one big brother and little sister. I grew up mostly in Jakarta but moved to Yogyakarta somewhere in 2015. There, I take my class as a Social Science Student for three years before got into Yogyakarta State University then Gadjah Mada University. Yes, I was actually a former college student at the neighbouring campus beside UGM. The reason why I applied there first is because my dad and mom didn’t want me to went lie idle for a year after I didn’t make it to Gadjah Mada and other universites I tried to pass in 2019, so luckily i found myself there majoring in Accounting. Then in August 2020, God had kindly prized my hard effort and prayers by letting me to study in UGM. My personality is kind of “low-class” one, being adore to stay in room all day and not going out with friends and fellows. However, i am also like to talk a lot about things when it’s come to being invited to jump in the group. In short, ambivert is what i’m living for.
“My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, usually goes by Ismail, or Mail by friends and parent.”
Compare yours to mine:
“My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, by I usually go by the name of Ismail, or Mail to my family and friends.”
Or…
“My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, although I am called just Ismail or Mail by my parents and friends.”
You wrote:
“I grew up mostly in Jakarta but moved to Yogyakarta somewhere in 2015. There, I take my class as a Social Science Student for three years before got into Yogyakarta State University then Gadjah Mada University.”
After my edits:
“I grew up mostly in Jakarta but moved to Yogyakarta sometime in 2015. There, I took my classes as a social science student for three years before getting into Yogyakarta State University then Gadjah Mada University.” (Make a not of what I changed and consider why I made those changes.)
Wait a minute. You must be at least 20 years old too.
Hello sir Adrian and every single one of you in this blog , I sincerely hope you all have a great day. I this occasion, let me tell you guys a little something about myself. My long name is Rafael Devin Primadi Anggoro, but I would prefer to be called “Devin” for short. I was born in Jogjakarta on June 4th 2002 on a lovely Tuesday evening, that’s also why my parents gave me the name “Anggoro”. My little family has 4 members, as I only have 1 sister. I was raised in several cities all over Indonesia. I went to pre-school in Pontianak, West Kalimantan, then I went to kindergarten in Jakarta. I lived there for 3 years, before moving to Pekanbaru, Riau for grade 2 and 3 of elementary school. I finished my elementary school education in Denpasar Bali, then moved back to Jakarta to learn in junior high school. After finishing my junior high school, I have to move to another city, which is Surabaya, where I went to St.Louis 1 Catholic Senior High School . and most currently , I got accepted in Gadjah Mada University, that means I will move back to the city that I was born in, Jogjakarta , to pursue higher education. I’m hoping to leave a good mark in this university, and I will try my best to do so. For my education plan , I would love to pursue double degree to Europe, as it would be a great boost to my career life. I think that’s all that I’m going to share to you on this occasion, cheers and have a wonderful weekend ahead!
I am not sure why, but you frequently have a space both before and after a comma; the space before it is incorrect.
Rafael wrote:
“Hello sir Adrian and every single one of you in this blog…”
The correct preposition is “on” and not “in”: “Have you read what’s on the the blog?”
You wrote:
“My little family has 4 members” and “I lived there for 3 years”.
Numbers below ten should be written as words. So, “three” is preferrable to “3” and it should be “four” instead of “4”.
You wrote:
“I would love to pursue double degree to Europe, as it would be a great boost to my career life.”
[1] The word “degree” is a countable noun so it should have an article, “a” or “the”, or a number (“A double degree is actually two degrees and not one degree”) if it is singular.
[2] You would pursue it IN Europe and not “to” Europe.
[3] It would be a great boost to your career or perhaps to your life but not to your “career life”. Maybe you means “life’s career” which would be better but it feels unnecessary as it is only during our lives that we have careers!
Hello everyone and of course Mr Adrian. My name is Logika Putra Janf, my friends call me Janf. I was born and raised in Jakarta. Atleast 75% percent of all the people that i’ve met always asked me questions regarding my name, i know it’s somewhat weird to have Logika as a first name which literally means logic, I dont know what my parents were thinking when they gave me that name but i can live with it, i mean there’s nothing that i could do now. As for my last name Janf, it was influenced by my Grandfather, he’s from the netherlands and just like my first name most people have hard time understanding or even pronouncing my last name, and it just so happens that Mr Adrian is one of those people who’s having a hard time pronouncing my name, sorry for the inconvenience sir. Enough about my odd name, just like any other people i also have hobbies of my own, i like to play video games in my spare time and for the last 2 years i’ve been collecting designer bags and sneakers, before anyone says that im a spoiled kid, i buy everything in my collection with my own money. I hope that through this class i could make a lot of friends and maybe one day, i could see them in the real world and not through a digital screen. The main reason i chose the IUP program is because it provides me with the opportunity to take a double degree program to go to my dream university in the Netherlands, Erasmus University. Nice to meet you all, oh and also you Mr Adrian. Have a good weekend sir and see you on the next “end of week chillout”.
I don’t know whether I should be thankful that three of the 13 occasions when you used “I”, the personal pronoun, you DID capitalize it, or whether I should be disappointed that you forgot to capitalize it on ten occasions. It’s a glass half full glass half empty situation.
Janf wrote:
“It just so happens that Mr Adrian is one of those people who’s having a hard time pronouncing my name, sorry for the inconvenience sir.”
Actually, I thought I handled it very well. You’ve hurt my feelings.
Don’t capitalize “Grandfather” but do capitalize “Netherlands”.
You wrote:
“I hope that through this class I could make a lot of friends and maybe one day I could see them in the real world and not through a digital screen.”
Take note of a few edits I’ve made to the sentence above. I also propose to change the word “could” to “can” on both occasions when you use it. "Could" is a modal verb used to express possibility or past ability (it is also used to make suggestions and requests and is more polite than “can”. "Could" is also commonly used in conditional sentences as the conditional form of "can." However, this conditional meaning does not seem appropriate. You will make friends and you will meet them “in the real world”, so the ‘doubt’ or hypothetical sense that the word “could” conveys doesn’t really fit what you are saying. Compare your to mine:
“I hope that, through this class, I can make a lot of friends and maybe, one day, I can see them in the real world and not through a digital screen.”
On a different point:
“see (your new friends) in the real world”
I will say the same thing to you that I said to Irene in the Thursday class. The expressions “in real life” and “in the real world” raises an interesting issue. There is nothing wrong with what you have written.
However, you being under quarantine, you engaging in virtual learning, you sitting in your bedroom staring at a laptop and wondering when you will get to meet your new classmates… this IS real life!
People refer to it as “the new normal”. If it’s normal then it is real!
Therfore, calling offline activity “real life” or the “real world” – and insinuating that online life is somehow NOT real – seems to me to be a rather ironic thing to say… so, if it were me writing, I would put “the real world” in quotation marks to indicate that I have my tongue in cheek.
Hi everyone. My name is Adisty Cantika Paramadhina, people usually call me Adisty. I was born in Surabaya, on the 1st of September 2002. I currently live in Gresik but when people ask me where I come from, I usually just say that I’m from Surabaya because it’s less complicated to explain. I graduated from SMAN 1 Gresik. Even though I studied natural science for the three years I was in high school, I didn’t really see myself studying it for college. So, I decided to apply to the international undergraduate program of Universitas Gadjah Mada as an accounting major and luckily, I was accepted. Besides the IUP test, I also took the UTBK entrance exam. I didn’t really expect anything from it because I was locked in the public bathroom of the building where I took the UTBK test, exactly 20 minutes before I had to take it. As you could probably guess, my mood was ruined and I thought I did the test badly. But the results came out with good news. I was accepted at Universitas Airlangga (a university in Surabaya), on the accounting program as well. I was faced with two choices but in the end, I chose Universitas Gadjah Mada. The main reason why I wanted to study somewhere far from where I currently live is because I want to start fresh where I can hopefully meet new friends and learn new things in a new environment. This past week, I had my first classes as a university student and Mr. Adrian’s class was a nice little closing which made me feel confident that I made the right choice.
“My name is Adisty Cantika Paramadhina, people usually call me Adisty.”
You need either “but” or “and” after the comma.
You wrote:
“I decided to apply to the international undergraduate program of Universitas Gadjah Mada as an accounting major.”
[1] You should capitalize the “International Undergraduate Program” because that is its official name.
[2] “Universitas Gadjah Mada”: I will say the same thing to you as I said to another student: Gadjah Mada University should not be written as “University of Gadjah Mada” in English as that is not its official international name (in English). The official English name of “Universitas Indonesia” is “University Of Indonesia”. And for “Universitas Airlangga”, it is “Airlangga University”
You wrote:
“I didn’t really expect anything from it because I was locked in the public bathroom of the building where I took the UTBK test, exactly 20 minutes before I had to take it.”
To be honest, it’s not exactly clear what this anecdote about “public bathroom” is about. You had a stomach ache?
You wrote:
“I had my first classes as a university student and Mr. Adrian’s class was a nice little closing which made me feel confident that I made the right choice.”
[1] The cheque is in the post.
[2] I’ll say the same to you as I said to Gabriel in the Monday class (and perhaps one or two other students]. It’s OK to call me Adrian. If you want to be more formal, the correct way to do it is to call me Mr Coen (or Mr. Coen, with a full stop after “Mr”, in American English; we British usually omit the full stop).
“Mister” goes with the family name: in this case, “Coen”. No native English speaker (at least not from my own country) would connect “Mister/Mr” to my first name (“Adrian”).
And, whatever you do, you don’t call someone just “Mister” in English because, while it is an understandable mistake, it does noy sound nice, and if I ever called another British person (just) “Mister” without their family name, it would sound unfriendly or hostile.
Hey everyone! My name is Schalke Anindya Putri, and people usually call me Schalke. It is a German name, but unfortunately, I am not German; I was born in Jakarta, on 10 March 2002. If you are wondering where my parents got that name from, well, it is a German football club. When I was born, my dad was watching a football match between Schalke and Bayern Munchen, and he decided that I would be named after the team that won. Now, can you imagine if Munchen won instead? Anyways, I was raised in a quite multicultural environment. When I was 6 months old, my parents took me and my brother to live in China. As a result, I spent about 9 years of my life living in 3 beautiful cities in China; namely Guangzhou, Beijing, and Shanghai. Being a place where I had based a part of my childhood on had made its national language, Mandarin, as my first language. However, I no longer speak the language very fluently anymore because Bahasa Indonesia and English have pretty much dominated my life. As I entered fourth grade, my parents brought me back to Indonesia, specifically to Bekasi. I had an insanely hard time adapting, mainly due to the language barriers and cultural differences. With all the challenges that I’d overcome over the past years, I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate in Economics and the studies of its fields, which has brought me here to UGM to study Economics; particularly, for my vast interest in studying Development Economics (which may sound boring to alot of people). I love traveling, but the Covid-19 pandemic had crushed all my travel plans this year. A fun fact of mine is perhaps that I love occupying my free time with volunteering activities and community services. I also LOVE reading and watching Mystery books and movies; so if you have any recommendations, let me know! Thank you for keeping up with me :)
This writing is very accurate and has good puntuation and word choice.
If other EWS students who are also good writers feel jealous that I did not say this to you too, please remember that it does not mean that I think it. Schalke wrote:
“It is a German name, but unfortunately, I am not German; I was born in Jakarta, on 10 March 2002.”
[1] This suggests that you wish you were German. Is it your intention to give your readers this impression?
[2] The semi colon is a nice touch. That is the correct way to use one.
You wrote:
“As a result, I spent about 9 years of my life living in 3 beautiful cities in China…”
It should be “nine” and “three”.
You wrote:
“I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate in Economics and the studies of its fields, which has brought me here to UGM to study Economics.”
[1] It should be “passionate about economics” and “economics” should not be capitalized. It is just a common noun unless you are talking explicitly about the official name of a course.
[2] The expression “and the studies of its fields” sounds awkward. Perhaps this is better: “I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate about economics and studies in that field.”
[3] You can avoid the repetition of “economics” (it’s always good practice to reduce repetition and redundancy) in this way; compare yours to mine:
“I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate about economics and and studies in that field, which has brought me here to UGM to study it as my major.”
You wrote:
“I also LOVE reading and watching Mystery books and movies; so if you have any recommendations, let me know!”
Hi friends! My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be referred as Alya. I was born on 17 July 2002 and I think that I am the perfect embodiment of Cancer, the zodiac. I am majoring in Management and this major is far different from what I intended to take initially. I have always been fascinated by genes and viruses all throughout high school. This fascination led me to a seat in Biomedical Engineering in the University of Manchester. I was supposed to go there until I had a heartfelt conversation with my mother and she managed to convince me to attend a whole different major in a whole different place. I am really glad with the decision I made though, it has barely been a month but I know that I love it already.
I liked writing. I used to write excerpts and proses and I would post them in an Instagram account throughout my last two years in high school. I used to find writing very relaxing and enjoyable but it has been really stressful since I got a writer’s block six months ago. I am looking forward to the day I can write just like how I used to. Besides writing, I enjoy reading scientific journals as well as novels and “self-help” books. Additionally, I might sound like a little kid but I still enjoy Disney movies and I always watch them when I’m feeling extremely sad and blue. Lastly, I really enjoy watching F1 with my boyfriend on race weekends. I love rooting for the underdogs even though it might seem silly. Feel free to talk with me if any of you like F1 too!
“My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be referred as Alya.”
[1] Supposing “referred” was the right word choice, then it would have to have the preposition “to” after it (“My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be referred to as Alya.”). However, I would suggest that this is preferrable: “My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be called Alya.” The word “referred to” works better with titles. “My name is Gerald Mortimer, but I prefer to be reffered to as Captain Mortimer,”
You wrote:
“This fascination led me to a seat in Biomedical Engineering in the University of Manchester.”
We get “a seat” in or at political institutions. We get “a place” at university.
You wrote:
“I was supposed to go there until I had a heartfelt conversation with my mother and she managed to convince me to attend a whole different major in a whole different place. I am really glad with the decision I made though, it has barely been a month but I know that I love it already.”
This is very intriguing. I will ask you about it at some point in the future.
Hello everyone! My name is Vania Nabillah Ramadhani, but you can simply call me Vania. I currently live in East Jakarta, and I have been living here for the past five years. A little fun fact about me, is that I’m actually Cirebonese, but I have never lived in Cirebon. I was born in Magetan, a small city in East Java back in 2002. Not long after, I moved to Yogyakarta and lived there for around 4 years. Then I moved to Australia for a year, and settled back in Magetan for around six months. Afterwards, I moved yet again to Lembang, Bandung when I was in 4th grade. I went back to Magetan again and called it home for the next three years before coming to Jakarta. Yes, I moved quite a lot. It was pretty fun but also challenging. Now, talking about my hobbies, I like to read books and the one that I’m currently reading is Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom. However, I’ve been limiting the amount of books to read ever since class started. I also like to swim, but sadly this pandemic is forcing me to hold back for a few months. My previous school, SMAN 67 Jakarta once held this event where all of the seniors would talk about their universities. I actually decided to study in Gadjah Mada University because of this event. One of my senior talked about the IUP program and I was intrigued. So, here I am now, studying economics in Gadjah Mada University. I’m super excited to study here and to meet new friends.
“A little fun fact about me, is that I’m actually Cirebonese, but I have never lived in Cirebon.”
I thought to myself, the “Cirebonese” people? Well, I don’t know anything about them, so I looked it up. And this is what wiki told me:
“The Cirebonese or Cirebonese people are an Austronesian ethnic group and nation native on the city of Cirebon and its immediate surrounding area, located in the northern part of the island of Java in Indonesia. Numbering approximately 1.9 million, the Cirebonese are mostly Muslim. Their language, Cirebonese, is a mixture of Javanese and Sundanese, with a heavier influence from Javanese, and as such is variably classified as either a dialect of both of those languages or as an independent language.”
Vania, you might not be the first ever Cirebonese IUP student I have taught, but you are certainly the first one who has identified yourself as being one.
You wrote: “A little fun fact about me, is that I’m actually Cirebonese.”
Be careful. The subject here is the noun phrase “A little fun fact about me” and you cannot separate this from its verb which is “is”. So, no comma after “me”. The comma after “Cirebonese” is correct because the subject “I” makes “but I have never lived in Cirebon” an independent clause.
Hello to everybody who is reading this, let me introduce myself. My name is Gerald Ivan Dharmawan and you can call me Gerald. I have lived in Jakarta since the 28th of November on the year 2001. Well, that is also the date when I went out of my mothers womb. Currently, I live in Kelapa Gading with my parents, my older brother, and my little sister. Basically, My father works in a bank called Danamon, my mother is a housewife, My brother studies at Padjajaran University, and my sister is in primary school. I’m a middle child and I am enjoying it because I have the privilege of having both a bigger and younger sibling. Since kinder garden, I went to the same school that is Penabur because it is so near to my house. To give an example of how near it is, it took me 5 minutes to walk from my house. I love doing sports on my leisure time but, I’m slacking a little bit since the pandemic because I the park near my house is closed. So, as a substitute, i basically do no sporty activities and I love scrolling through my phone till midnight. As the reason right now I am writing this, I am studying Accounting at Gadjah Mada University or we usually say UGM. To be honest, UGM is not my first priority of college that I planned to attend. But, I’m not pissed for the fact that I wasn’t accepted at my first priority college because I also realized that I want to study in Yogja, the city that is known as the city for students. Also, UGM is currently ranked numbe one in Indonesia and who doesn’t want to study there. IUP UGM is my first international school that I attend and I am shocked because of the fact that everybody here is so fluent at Speaking English. I think it will take a while till I get used to all of this. In conclusion, I hope we could meet on the second semester and I could feel the vibes of becoming a part of UGM
“I have lived in Jakarta since the 28th of November on the year 2001.”
Yes. That is the date of your birth. This is an interesting way of expressing this information. Do remember, however, that it should be “in” and not “on” the year 2001 and also remember that the expression “In the year 1999…” (and similar) is very formal and usually only used in declarations or formal announcements. The way you use it here, though, is nice because it is mildy humorous.
Hi, all! I am Shalsadilla Nadya Prameswary. People are always confused whether they want to call me Shalsa, Dilla, or Nadya but honestly I prefer to be called Nadya. I live in Yogyakarta for my whole life since 20th of July 2002 which is the day when I was born. I graduated from SMA N 8 Yogyakarta which is a public school, so I barely use English in my daily life before I entered IUP Class in UGM. I really enjoy being involved in social activities, organizing events, and many more. I do love meeting people and have such social interaction, but since I am an introvert (INFP-T) I need more time to adapt and time to ‘recharge’ my energy after meeting a lot people. My hobbies are baking, playing musics, and traveling! Since I live in Yogyakarta for 18 years, if you want to stroll around the city and look for interesting places here, don’t hesitate to contact me!
“I live in Yogyakarta for my whole life since 20th of July 2002 which is the day when I was born.”
[1] It should be “I have lived in Yogyakarta…”. We know this is usually the correct grammar when it is followed by “for” + an amount of time or “since” + a date, time or event in the past.
[2] Compare yours to mine:
“I have lived in Yogyakarta since 20th of July 2002 which was the day when I was born.”
Hi, everyone. My name is Tallulah Humaira Ihsan – Lulu for short. I turned eighteen this year on the fifteenth of August. I was born, raised, and currently am in Jakara. Having lived in the same city my entire life, it’s safe to say I’m quite nervous about moving to another city where I’ll be all alone. Though despite the nerves, the excitement is definitely there as well. Yogyakarta is a city well known for its rich cuisine and culinary treats, which is really thrilling since I’m a huge foodie! I have a food blog on Instagram which I post on just for fun, though it really warms my heart when people actually message me asking for restaurant and food recommendations. I studied science in high school because my mom kind of drilled into my mind that I wanted to study medicine, and I really thought I did. However, nearing the time when university entrance exams were about to happen, I realized that I couldn’t imagine myself slaving over thousand-page textbooks day and night, studying corpses, and memorizing the Latin names of all the 200-something bones in a human body for, give or take, seven years, only for me to become a general practitioner! So, here I am now, studying at the Faculty of Economics and Business of Gadjah Mada University. I hope to meet everyone in person as soon as possible, but as of now, I do believe that this semester being held online is the wisest choice for all of us.
This is a very interesting sentence: the way you have used “am” and not repeated the pronoun “I”. It sounds a little bit idiosyncratic but I don’t think it’s wrong. It’s unusual to encounter the verb “am” separated from the subject “I”. So it’s OK. But if it made me (as a reader) stumble over it, then perhaps it detracts from the impact of the words. I suggest this instead:
“I was born, raised, and currently live in Jakara.”
Hello everyone! my name is Sarah Salsabila Umar but you can call me Sarah. My birthday is on 31 January 2002, so im currently 18 years old. I graduated from Tunas Muda School, which is an IB school located in West Jakarta. My high school life was full of tears and tons of assignment every single day. However, after 3 years of hard work i finally finished my high school with quite a satisfactory result. I was planning to go to Germany once i graduated since my older sister lives there and she thinks that the education in Germany is one of the best in the world. Therefore, i decide to apply to the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management and got accepted after 2 weeks of waiting for the results. I was happy that i got accepted but turns out my parents asked me to apply to a university in Indonesia and they suggested UGM, therefore i decide to take the test and also got accepted. It was a spontaneous decision.
No, it’s not. Your birthday WAS on 31 January 2002, while your birthday IS on 31 January. See what I mean?
You wrote:
“I was happy that I got accepted but turns out my parents asked me to apply to a university in Indonesia and they suggested UGM, therefore i decide to take the test and also got accepted.”
The prepostional verb “to turn out” needs a subject and for this particular verb the subject is very often simply “it”. Next, you are telling the story in the past tense so it needs to be: “…it turned out my parents asked me to apply to a university in Indonesia.” (turned not turns.)
The same applies to the verb “decide” in the last part of the sentence; it needs to be past tense, as does “get” but you got that one right.
Hello! My name is Saidah Intan Indriati, but people usually call me Intan. I was born and raised in Tangerang and I graduated from BINUS SCHOOL Serpong this year after majoring in IT & Sociology. I have one older sister and she is 8 years older than me. I like cats, and I’m currently taking care of 5 at home. I decided to study Management in FEB UGM because I’ve always wanted to run my own business later in the future, and I want to equip myself with proper and sufficient knowledge before I do that. My hobbies include watching some TV series and cooking. Lately, I’ve been watching Archer on Netflix because I enjoy espionage-themed shows. And since I’m new at cooking, I’ve only been following really easy recipes on YouTube – but they have all been really great so far! Apart from watching movies and cooking, I also like to read fiction sometimes.
“I graduated from BINUS SCHOOL Serpong this year after majoring in IT & Sociology.”
This does not sound right to my British ears; maybe it is an American thing? I don’t think the words “major” and “majoring” are appropriate for secondary education and are, in fact, the terminology of tertiary (higher) education and, indeed, only for undergraduates doing bachelor’s degrees (as opposes to master’s and doctrates).
This is a good, above average (for this IUP group) piece of writing, Intan. Well done. I could have said the same thing to others too, but – hey – you others out there whose ‘above-averageness’ I have not acknowledged, don’t be jealous.
Hello, everyone! My name is Pranaja Kresnaperdhana but I usually go by Naja for short. Currently I am living in Tangerang Selatan, Jakarta’s little less popular, but equally as crowded younger sister. I graduated from BINUS School earlier this year and right now, as you already know, I am going to Universitas Gadjah Mada for my higher education, majoring in management. I actually majored in science in my previous school because of my love for biology and mathematics. When I was little, I even wanted to be a vet. After I found out a degree in veterinary is not a piece of cake to get, I had to look for another major. I was thinking of a taking a specific course like event or fashion management, but I ended up choosing international management in UGM because of their dual degree program. I personally have a huge interest in music. I am not saying I’m talented in music or have a great taste in it, but I listen to music a lot. Plus, my ears are open wide for all kinds of music, so don’t hesitate to recommend me your favorite tunes. Country to K-Pop, Soul to Rap, I will listen to all of your inputs. Other than music, I am also addicted to podcasts. Though I consider myself new in the world of podcasts, I think whoever invented it was a genius. I usually listen to stories about criminology, paranormal experiences, or even unexplained mysteries before I go to bed. A common misconception about me is that people think that I’m not scared about thriller or horror stuffs. To be honest, I am terrified. But something about it keeps my adrenaline going. By the way, do not hesitate to greet me or follow me on social media. I would love to hear about all of you and your stories. I even referred to my self as a free on-call psychologist because my friends always look for me if they are having a problem, being indecisive or in need of an advice.
“As you already know, I am going to Universitas Gadjah Mada for my higher education, majoring in management.”
[1] See what I said to Adisty further up the page.
[2] The sentence “I am going to Gadjah Mada University” probably works better after you are accepted and up until you arrive here. So, now that you are already here (so to speak), then “attending” should probably replace “going to”.
Hello everyone! My name is Sekar Pramesti Ratri Maheswari but you can just call me Sekar. I was born in Jakarta on 15th of September in 2002. I am a student from the Management Departement in Gajah Mada University and my dream is to become a marketing strategist at a startup company. I have one younger sister and her name is Laras and I am the oldest of two siblings. I have several reasons of why I decided to enroll to UGM in the first place. The first reason is because most of my families are alumnus of UGM, so I feel inspired by them. The second reason is because UGM is the best university of Indonesia according to the national statistics and also the Faculty of Economics and Business in UGM has been accredited by AACSB in 2014, so that’s saying something. And the last reason is because I love Jogja. My hometown is Jogja, so every Ramadhan and New Year’s Eve, I go there to visit my grandmother for 2 weeks. I just love the atmosphere. They’re just something that’s really enticing about that city. My main focus in my years as a university student is to grow and socialize more. I was a shy kid in high school and I just think that now is the time to turn things around. Now, we are young adults and not kids anymore. My plan in UGM is to have high GPAs so that I can enroll my double degree to study abroad. Beside that I would also like to contribute in many competitions and organizations, not only to have new experience but to also learn how to understand teamwork. My hobbies include traveling, watching movies, discovering new artists to listen to and socializing with my friends. I also love to review movies and then post them on my Instagram page dedicated for reviewing movies and random things that I like, more often that I do on my main Instagram page. My favorite movies are often my comfort movies. Movies that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand. I also like to watch tv shows in my free time and probably rewatch them until I get bored of them (which rarely happens). Some of which include, The Politician, Glee and the 100. All in all, I love many things including studying and just being myself. I really hope that I can be a great student and learn more things in UGM.
“My favorite movies are often my comfort movies. Movies that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand.”
Almost 35% of the first 10 words of the above quote are the word “movies”! The repetition makes it slightly clumsy. Actually, I now see that the word “movies” also occurs three times in the previous couple of sentences. So let’s have a look at a bigger excerpt of text:
You wrote:
BEFORE: “My hobbies include traveling, watching movies, discovering new artists to listen to and socializing with my friends. I also love to review movies and then post them on my Instagram page dedicated for reviewing movies and random things that I like, more often that I do on my main Instagram page. My favorite movies are often my comfort movies. Movies that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand.” Compare my version to yours:
AFTER: “My hobbies include traveling, watching movies, discovering new artists, and socializing with my friends. I also love to write about movies and then post my reviews on my Instagram page dedicated to such things, whereas random things that I like, more often, I post on my main Instagram page. My favorite movies are the ones I think of as my “comfort movies”; those that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand.”
[1] The words “to listen to” (after “new artists “) seemed redundant to me.
[2] Notice the ‘Oxford comma’ I inserted.
[3] My edits are ideas related to style and smoothness and are not meant to be seen as me pointing out errors.
Good afternoon everyone! In this opportunity that Mr. Adrian gave me, please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Aisyah Afifah Darmawan, but you can call me Afi. If I’m being honest here, I don’t really like my first and middle name. The first one is just too heavy for me, too many obligations to deserve the name of Muhammad’s youngest wife. My middle name just sounds very Arabic. Not trying to be such a nationalist, but I just feel like it would be better if my parents gave me a local name. So, I go with Afi everywhere. I like that name and some people said that it suits my personality very well. For your information, my Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality is ENFP-A. I just got that result like three days ago, so it is pretty much valid. I was born in Jakarta, April 17th 2002. It may be too much information, but my birth time is 11 PM. In case anyone wants to check my astrology birth chart or even primbon. I went to a three different school when I was kindergarten, but I don’t think you need to know the name of the schools. Please note that I move out a lot. No offense for Jakarta citizens, but your city just won’t stop flooding. I went to SDIT Auliya for my primary education, it is located near Bintaro Jaya. After that I continued my education at Labschool Kebayoran Junior High School. I love my junior high school life and Labsky really mold my way of thinking. For my high school education, my parents put me in an Islamic boarding school called SMAIT Asy-Syifa. It is located in Subang, Jawa Barat. Even though I drop myself out from there, I really appreciate what Asy-Syifa taught me, mostly about life skill and how to not become a crybaby. I went to SMAN 2 Tangerang Selatan for my 11th and 12th grade. Many things happened in my school life, some of them are life-changing events. So, that’s all, thank you for your time.
Hello there ! My name is Benedictus Hanzen Kurniawan, I was born on the 3rd of November 2001, i am the second of two children. My sister is 6 years older than me and she is a doctor and planting to become an Orthopedist. Currently i enrolled in the Faculty of Economics and Business IUP UGM with the major of Acccounting, but fun fact in the beginning before Covid -19 hits I was planning to go to Tilburg University in the Netherlands to pursue my Econometrics degree but because of Covid – 19 in March they cancelled my application because there was no UN ( Ujian Nasional ) and so I quickly decided to apply to UGM IUP so in the future I can have a chance to pursue my dream to study in Netherlands at Erasmus University. I chose accounting because at first I was quite confuse with what major do I take, and after quite substansial time of searching I decided to choose Accounting for me to take. I choose accounting because I want to pursue and challenge myself to be an accountant and many people often told me that accounting is a hard material to learn but after reading the material and so on I think accounting is a skill that everyone should have even at the most basic level to understand and because of that I choose to apply at FEB IUP UGM and UGM is the best university in Indonesia.
“Currently i enrolled in the Faculty of Economics and Business IUP UGM with the major of Acccounting.”
[1] You should have a comma after “currently”.
[2] Capitalize “I”
[3] “the major of Acccounting” should be “in accounting” (small “a” for accounting and the preposition is “in” and not “of”)
[4] Elsewhere Econometrics and Accounting should start with small letters. You wrote:
“I chose accounting because at first I was quite confuse with what major do I take, and after quite substansial time of searching I decided to choose Accounting for me to take.”
Compare your to mine:
“I chose accounting because, at first, I was quite confused about what major to take, and after quite substantial time spent searching, I decided on accounting.”
Consider why I made each of my edits (including a spelling correction).
Greetings everyone! My name is Qeyra Noer Aumara Arsyi. My original nickname is Arsyi but a bit of an identity change might be a good start of my college live so please, call me Mara instead. I was born on November 1st 2001 in Surabaya, but never actually experienced living there. So no, I don’t claim myself as an east-Javanese. In fact, I don’t claim myself as any of Indonesian ethnic-tribe or whatsoever, although both my parents actually grew up in east java. My dad works as a banker so we constantly move from town to town in approximately every two years. I have lived in ten different cities and gone to nine different schools ever since I was born and that’s on struggling with identity crisis.I currently live at Cirebon and have just graduated from SMA Negeri 2. A lot has happened here since this is the longest period of time I’ve spent living in one city. I joined a debate team, had my first band and performed on a lot of event, broke some rules as well along the way but all the ups and downs kind of change me into a whole new person. UGM is a huge miracle for I have never thought that aiming for it is a realistic dream, let alone being accepted in IUP. I have never even gone to a proper English course so what you are reading right now is pure YouTube and subtitled movies product of a skill . But then again self-doubting isn’t an option anymore because now that I am here, it means I deserve it and all I have to do is prove that I am meant to be here. All that being said, please help me developing my lame skill sir Adrien, I am in desperate need of help.
“My original nickname is Arsyi but a bit of an identity change might be a good start of my college live so please, call me Mara instead.”
The comma needs to be after “life” (not “live”).
You wrote:
“I joined a debate team, had my first band and performed on a lot of event, broke some rules as well along the way but all the ups and downs kind of change me into a whole new person.”
Compare yours to mine:
“I joined a debate team, and I had my first band which performed at a lot of events. I broke some rules as well along the way but all the ups and downs have kind of changed me into a whole new person.”
Take note of the changes I have made and consider why I did them.
You wrote:
“A bit of an identity change might be a good start of my college live” and “I broke some rules, as well, along the way” and “all the ups and downs have kind of changed me into a whole new person”.
My name is Radhi Rijal Muliarto and I am an alumni of Sekolah Highscope Indonesia. People usually call me Radhi. I am doing well academically and socially active in organizations. I may consider myself a self-motivated learner and is open to new perspectives and views. In school, I participated in committees such as our school’s Model United Nation (HSMUN) and is organizationally active in attending futsal and basketball extracurricular. Economics has always intrigued me, particularly the economics of a certain country. Every country has its own strategies on how to boost their economy. This curiosity on how different countries run their economy has led me to make a mini thesis in my senior year in highschool. The title of the thesis is Docking Sector Is the Future of Indonesia’s Economy. This thesis discusses how Indonesia could boost its economy and be one the most influential country in the world by improving its docking system and international trade. This thesis is a stepping stone for me to expand my curiosity to other economics ideas. In my free time I like to hang out with my family and friends, either its getting dinner or just hanging out in a coffee shop. When I'm stressed out sports is my therapy. Sport is something for me to escape from the real world and just enjoy the moment. Anyway nice meeting all of you I hope we can be friends from having this English class together.
“In my free time I like to hang out with my family and friends, either its getting dinner or just hanging out in a coffee shop.”
You don’t need “its” and, even if you did, it would be “it’s”!
You wrote:
“Economics has always intrigued me, particularly the economics of a certain country. Every country has its own strategies on how to boost their economy.”
Compare yours to mine:
“Economics has always intrigued me, particularly the systems in specific countries, each of which has its own strategies on how to boost its economy.”
Hello everyone! My name is Manuel Reinhart Garcia Pasaribu, but you can call me Reinhart. I turned eighteen this year on the seventh of August. I was born and grew up in Depok, I’ve lived here my whole life. It is safe to say that I don’t like to leave this city just because I want to get enrolled in a university, but because it is the only choice I have. You might ask “why it is my only choice?” that is a good question you have there, so let me tell you my story. I was not a diligent student when I was in the third grade of high school, because of that my parents put me into some learning course. The learning course was fine, but the assignment they gave was too many that it got my school’s assignment forgotten. So, I had a plan to make my life easier, I started to skip the course’s class, procrastinated all the assignments, and enjoy my free day as a normal student. Of course, this plan didn’t last long enough until my parents found out that I was skipping the classes. From there everything went downhill, I got dropped out from the learning course and my parents lose their hope on me. I know this was all my fault but at that time I planned an act of revenge for the company of the course by using UGM’s IUP, so I can get enrolled faster than their students. I studied all day just to prepare for the test and to prove to my parents that I didn’t need a learning course to get enrolled in a university. When it was the day of the test, I feel very confident about my chances of getting enrolled and it was true I got accepted in UGM. Do you know what I did after that? I showed the result to the chairman of Depok’s course and it shocked all the teachers and even my friends. They still can’t believe that a procrastinator can achieve something like UGM’s IUP. Even my parents still felt super happy for me. Well, that is my journey to achieve UGM and I hope that I won’t be a procrastinator in UGM because I want to make my parent’s dream come true. So yeah thank you for reading my story and please Mr. Adrian teach me anything about writing skills because it is a very useful skill to have when I go abroad.
What an enjoyable story you have told, Reinhart. You have made your flaws and weaknesses sound very interesting! And the writing is pretty good too. However, I have run out of time. Next week I will START out by commenting on your writing before I look at anyone else’s.
Hello there my name is Bernadhita Tamara Angelia Wardhana but for your sake you can call me Tamara. My birthday is on September 10th so about 8 days ago I turned 20 years old. I graduated at The Newman School, Boston class of 2018 with an IB Certificates that I cherish dearly because I put my tears and sweats to get that piece of paper. Then, because I developed interest in Fashion during that time I started to applied on short online courses in Parsons and FIDM and then for a year I studied at Milan in Istituto Marangoni majoring in Fashion Business, and the plan was to continue my second year in London to get a bachelor degree but I decided to take a year off to really know if Fashion Business is something that I really want. During my year off I realise that I actually curious and want to learn more about business especially in the finance aspect, so that leads me for applying at UGM's IUP Accounting major.
ReplyDeleteSo, if I am not mistaken, you are the oldest IUP student.
DeleteTamara wrote:
“I decided to take a year off to really know if Fashion Business is something that I really want. During my year off I realise that I actually curious and want to learn more about business especially in the finance aspect, so that leads me for applying at UGM's IUP Accounting major.”
[1] You started this with the past tense: “I decided to take a year off…”. This is fine. I suggest you continue with that. Look at this:
“I DECIDED to take a year off to really know if working in the fashion business WAS something that I really WANTED to do.”
Note some other edits I have made.
[2] The words “Fashion Business” are not capitalized.
[3] We continue the past tense thing… “During my year off, I REALISED that I WAS actually curious and WANTED to learn more about business especially the finance aspect.”
Once again, take note of the other edits I have made.
You wrote:
“I put my tears and sweats to get that piece of paper…”
The expression you are looking for, conventionally, is “blood, sweat and tears”. Note the order of the words. Now, I don’t know whether “blood” fits your story! However, it’s just a figure of speech, so it’s OK. Compare yours to mine and note the one or two other changes I have made:
“I put my blood, sweat and tears into getting that piece of paper…”
Greetings! My name is Sabrina Eunice Susanto, but I assume that would be too much of a mouthful to say at once, so let’s settle with calling me Sabrina or Sabby for short. I was born on the 8th of May in 2002, so that makes me a Taurus (just a fun astrology fact there), and my MBTI personality type is an INTP. I assume I would not be as interesting to read about as I have not travelled nor lived in as many countries as my other classmates have, but I would like to pride myself on having an okay sense of humor. Or, enough that people would still want to be friends with me. What else can I say? I’ve been living in South Tangerang my whole life, after all. I went to elementary and junior high school in an international school, but then transferred to SMA UPH College High School, which resulted in, though not as an extreme transitional period as moving to a whole other country, quite the culture shock for me who had been in the same school previously for about thirteen years or so. I expect moving to Yogyakarta later on would be quite the big deal for me, but I’ll let Miss Corona take the wheel in deciding whether or not I’m ready to go there yet. Oh, I also love reading. Doesn’t necessarily have to be books, but they do have to be interesting. I am currently reading ‘All the Light We Cannot See’ by Anthony Doerr and my favorite book is ‘Aristotle and Dante Discovers the Secrets of the Universe’. Anyway, it was nice to meet you, Sir Adrien, a very entertaining, funny, amazing individual (will you give me extra points for this flattery?), and I hope we can work well later on!
ReplyDeleteSabrina wrote:
Delete“My name is Sabrina Eunice Susanto, but I assume that would be too much of a mouthful to say at once, so let’s settle with calling me Sabrina or Sabby for short.”
This is a great start and I can only find one small thing to correct!
The words “settle with” mean something else (“I settled with my accusser out of court”).
The preposition you need is “for”; to “settle for” something means ‘accept something less than what you wanted’. You saying this in your opening sentences is mildly humorous, which I think is your intent.
You wrote:
“I expect moving to Yogyakarta later on would be quite the big deal for me, but I’ll let Miss Corona take the wheel in deciding whether or not I’m ready to go there yet.”
Another nice, light-hearted sentence. And here’s me, nitpicking again!
“Moving to Yogyakarta” is not hypothetical or in doubt, so you should use “will” rather than “would”.
Sabrina wrote:
Delete"It was nice to meet you, Sir Adrien, a very entertaining, funny, amazing individual (will you give me extra points for this flattery?)"
No. Just money. Bank transfer or cash?
Hi everyone. My name is Salmaa Khoirunnisa. You can just call me Salmaa- the second “a” is pretty much silent. I was born in Indonesia, but I have lived abroad since I was young as my dad got a job overseas. Despite living overseas for 10 years, I am still not confident in my language skills as it is not really my passion. On top of that, I was living in Singapore which is known for our broken English. Hence, my language is never my strength.
ReplyDeleteIf you were wondering why I chose to go to the university in Indonesia, instead of the universities in Singapore, I will honestly admit that it was because of my family’s financial status. My dad ended his contract with the company he was working for in Singapore and migrated back to Indonesia when I was still pursuing my diploma in Singapore. I was lucky enough to be admitted into the top universities in Singapore, but the school fees were too much, and I felt guilty towards my parents for using a large sum of money for my education. Hence, I choose to follow my dad’s and sister’s footsteps and join the UGM family.
To be very honest, I feel quite intimidated to start a new journey in Indonesia as I realized that Indonesians enter universities at a very young age (18 or 19 years old). Whereas in Singapore, it is common for us to start universities when we are 20 years old. Hence, my confidence has been lacking ever since I migrated back to Indonesia. However, I still believe that all education is good no matter where you obtain it from. Thus, I look forward to my new chapter in Yogyakarta surrounded by the UGM family.
Salmaa wrote:
Delete“Hence, I choose to follow my dad’s and sister’s footsteps and join the UGM family.”
This sentence came at the end of a long paragraph where you were telling your story, which you did using the past tense. So it was odd to suddenly hear you talk about this choice you made in the present tense; you made that choice in the past, so the final sentence should be in the past tense just like the sentences prior to it.
You wrote:
“To be very honest, I feel quite intimidated to start a new journey in Indonesia as I realized that Indonesians enter universities at a very young age (18 or 19 years old).”
Actually, quite a lot of IUP students are still 17 years old presumably because they went on the so-called fast track when they were at senior high school (have I got this right?).
You wrote:
“Hence, my confidence has been lacking ever since I migrated back to Indonesia.”
It’s not clear why your confidence would be diminished by you being older than many people around you.
Who is the older, Tamara or you?
(Note that I did not say “oldest”.)
So, you speak Singlish?
Deletehttps://febcampus.blogspot.com/2020/09/lets-singlish-lah.html
Hello everyone my name is Rafie Danishwara, you can call me Rafie i'm part of the International Undergraduate Programme in which i major in the Management. Currently i am 18 and am living in Tangerang in the midst of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Originally me joining UGM was something i have thought as a fluke for i only joined the entrance exam on a whim. The only reason i had joined the entrance exam was because my sister had graduation for UGM the day prior for the entrance exam so therefore my dad had the idea for me to just join the test because it's on the following day. I was suprised because i wasn't ready for it but in the end i suprised myself by being accepted in the first intake for which i also feel it was a fluke or i probably don't deserve it as much as someone who actually prepared for months or weeks prior to the exam. The prospect of moving to Jogja for me is quite interesting for i've been there a couple times and the atmosphere and food is quite to my liking. But living alone is definitely going to be a new challenge. Before UGM i had also plans to apply for Monash but currently the situation is still unclear with them so for the current time i will continue my studies with UGM.
ReplyDelete[1] Rafie, you need to always be aware of what tense you are writing in and pay attention to it. You seem to shift between present tense and past tense quite a lot. You even use the past perfect tense – which is good; many writers avoid it because they are unsure exactly when to use it – but you aren’t consistent.
Delete[2] You just capitalize “I” (the pronoun) always, unless it’s a kind of arty affectation in a poem (like HERE https://tinyurl.com/yxmr7r5g for example).
[3] More than 230 words (and eight sentences) and no commas? That is peculiar. If I asked you to use commas in order to make your writing smoother for your readers, where would you insert them? Something to think about. (Edit: wait, no. There is ONE comma. Sorry.)
Hello everyone, my name is Audrey Fikrah Himmah Ramayandi and you can call me Audrey. I'm 17 years old. I was born and raised in Bekasi and I just finished my studies about several months ago at Al-Azhar 4 senior high school. Currently, I’m a student of Gadjah Mada University at Yogyakarta, but because of the pandemic, I have to stayed in Bekasi for the whole semester. I'm actually attending the International Undergraduate Program class at Gadjah Mada University. The reason why I’m joining the International Undergraduate Program is because in the future we’ll be living in a global society and IUP will give me everything in order to survive in that condition not only from knowledge but also from international exposure. There is a double degree program, that program will allow me to achieve a double degree, and also double degree program will allow me to find a suitable job with a better position in some great companies in Indonesia. I am very confident that by becoming an IUP student, I can contribute to the people of Indonesia. I choose Gadjah Mada University because it is located in the best city for learning in Indonesia. my ambition to become an accountant leads me to study accounting major as my whole family worked as an accountant. Before I accepted at Gadjah Mada University, I already accepted at Diponegoro University as an accounting student in the international program. But after several weeks, there is an announcement that I have been accepted as Gadjah Mada University Student. Well, since UGM has the upper hand in the accounting program, therefore I choose Gadjah Mada University as my next step toward the future.
ReplyDeleteAudrey wrote:
Delete“I just finished my studies about several months ago.”
Both words, “about” and “several”, indicate approximation (meaning you are not trying to be precise). So having them BOTH in your sentence sounds clumsy. Compare my two alternatives to your sentence:
“I just finished my studies several months ago.”
“I just finished my studies about three months ago.”
You wrote:
“The reason why I’m joining the International Undergraduate Program is because in the future we’ll be living in a global society and IUP will give me everything in order to survive in that condition not only from knowledge but also from international exposure.”
This is a fine sentence. However, it would benefit from a few commas. Take a look at my version and pay attention to where I have inserted the aforementioned commas:
“The reason why I’m joining the International Undergraduate Program is because, in the future, we’ll be living in a global society, and IUP will give me everything I need in order to survive in those conditions, not only the necessary knowledge, but also from international exposure.”
Note that I have made one or two other edits too. See if you can spot them and consider why I made those changes.
Note: I think you are overstating what IUP will do for you… it “…will give me everything I need in order to survive in those conditions…”. I don’t think it will give you “everything”, but it will give you a good a start as you could hope for from what is, after all, Indonesia’s No.1 ranked university according to the 2021 QS Rankings… hip hip, hooray!!
Hello Mr Adrian and all of my friends, allow me to present myself before you. My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, usually goes by Ismail, or Mail by friends and parent. I came to this world on 12th of July, 2001 in Harapan Bunda Hospital, east Jakarta city. I am the second child in my family with one big brother and little sister. I grew up mostly in Jakarta but moved to Yogyakarta somewhere in 2015. There, I take my class as a Social Science Student for three years before got into Yogyakarta State University then Gadjah Mada University.
ReplyDeleteYes, I was actually a former college student at the neighbouring campus beside UGM. The reason why I applied there first is because my dad and mom didn’t want me to went lie idle for a year after I didn’t make it to Gadjah Mada and other universites I tried to pass in 2019, so luckily i found myself there majoring in Accounting. Then in August 2020, God had kindly prized my hard effort and prayers by letting me to study in UGM.
My personality is kind of “low-class” one, being adore to stay in room all day and not going out with friends and fellows. However, i am also like to talk a lot about things when it’s come to being invited to jump in the group. In short, ambivert is what i’m living for.
Ismail wrote:
Delete“My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, usually goes by Ismail, or Mail by friends and parent.”
Compare yours to mine:
“My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, by I usually go by the name of Ismail, or Mail to my family and friends.”
Or…
“My name is Ismail As’Ad Taridi, although I am called just Ismail or Mail by my parents and friends.”
You wrote:
“I grew up mostly in Jakarta but moved to Yogyakarta somewhere in 2015. There, I take my class as a Social Science Student for three years before got into Yogyakarta State University then Gadjah Mada University.”
After my edits:
“I grew up mostly in Jakarta but moved to Yogyakarta sometime in 2015. There, I took my classes as a social science student for three years before getting into Yogyakarta State University then Gadjah Mada University.” (Make a not of what I changed and consider why I made those changes.)
Wait a minute. You must be at least 20 years old too.
Who is the oldest, Tamara, Salmaa or Ismail?
(Note that I did not say “older”.)
Hello sir Adrian and every single one of you in this blog , I sincerely hope you all have a great day. I this occasion, let me tell you guys a little something about myself. My long name is Rafael Devin Primadi Anggoro, but I would prefer to be called “Devin” for short. I was born in Jogjakarta on June 4th 2002 on a lovely Tuesday evening, that’s also why my parents gave me the name “Anggoro”. My little family has 4 members, as I only have 1 sister. I was raised in several cities all over Indonesia. I went to pre-school in Pontianak, West Kalimantan, then I went to kindergarten in Jakarta. I lived there for 3 years, before moving to Pekanbaru, Riau for grade 2 and 3 of elementary school. I finished my elementary school education in Denpasar Bali, then moved back to Jakarta to learn in junior high school. After finishing my junior high school, I have to move to another city, which is Surabaya, where I went to St.Louis 1 Catholic Senior High School . and most currently , I got accepted in Gadjah Mada University, that means I will move back to the city that I was born in, Jogjakarta , to pursue higher education. I’m hoping to leave a good mark in this university, and I will try my best to do so. For my education plan , I would love to pursue double degree to Europe, as it would be a great boost to my career life. I think that’s all that I’m going to share to you on this occasion, cheers and have a wonderful weekend ahead!
ReplyDeleteI am not sure why, but you frequently have a space both before and after a comma; the space before it is incorrect.
DeleteRafael wrote:
“Hello sir Adrian and every single one of you in this blog…”
The correct preposition is “on” and not “in”: “Have you read what’s on the the blog?”
You wrote:
“My little family has 4 members” and “I lived there for 3 years”.
Numbers below ten should be written as words. So, “three” is preferrable to “3” and it should be “four” instead of “4”.
You wrote:
“I would love to pursue double degree to Europe, as it would be a great boost to my career life.”
[1] The word “degree” is a countable noun so it should have an article, “a” or “the”, or a number (“A double degree is actually two degrees and not one degree”) if it is singular.
[2] You would pursue it IN Europe and not “to” Europe.
[3] It would be a great boost to your career or perhaps to your life but not to your “career life”. Maybe you means “life’s career” which would be better but it feels unnecessary as it is only during our lives that we have careers!
Hello everyone and of course Mr Adrian. My name is Logika Putra Janf, my friends call me Janf. I was born and raised in Jakarta. Atleast 75% percent of all the people that i’ve met always asked me questions regarding my name, i know it’s somewhat weird to have Logika as a first name which literally means logic, I dont know what my parents were thinking when they gave me that name but i can live with it, i mean there’s nothing that i could do now. As for my last name Janf, it was influenced by my Grandfather, he’s from the netherlands and just like my first name most people have hard time understanding or even pronouncing my last name, and it just so happens that Mr Adrian is one of those people who’s having a hard time pronouncing my name, sorry for the inconvenience sir. Enough about my odd name, just like any other people i also have hobbies of my own, i like to play video games in my spare time and for the last 2 years i’ve been collecting designer bags and sneakers, before anyone says that im a spoiled kid, i buy everything in my collection with my own money. I hope that through this class i could make a lot of friends and maybe one day, i could see them in the real world and not through a digital screen. The main reason i chose the IUP program is because it provides me with the opportunity to take a double degree program to go to my dream university in the Netherlands, Erasmus University. Nice to meet you all, oh and also you Mr Adrian.
ReplyDeleteHave a good weekend sir and see you on the next “end of week chillout”.
I don’t know whether I should be thankful that three of the 13 occasions when you used “I”, the personal pronoun, you DID capitalize it, or whether I should be disappointed that you forgot to capitalize it on ten occasions. It’s a glass half full glass half empty situation.
DeleteJanf wrote:
“It just so happens that Mr Adrian is one of those people who’s having a hard time pronouncing my name, sorry for the inconvenience sir.”
Actually, I thought I handled it very well. You’ve hurt my feelings.
Don’t capitalize “Grandfather” but do capitalize “Netherlands”.
You wrote:
“I hope that through this class I could make a lot of friends and maybe one day I could see them in the real world and not through a digital screen.”
Take note of a few edits I’ve made to the sentence above. I also propose to change the word “could” to “can” on both occasions when you use it. "Could" is a modal verb used to express possibility or past ability (it is also used to make suggestions and requests and is more polite than “can”. "Could" is also commonly used in conditional sentences as the conditional form of "can." However, this conditional meaning does not seem appropriate. You will make friends and you will meet them “in the real world”, so the ‘doubt’ or hypothetical sense that the word “could” conveys doesn’t really fit what you are saying. Compare your to mine:
“I hope that, through this class, I can make a lot of friends and maybe, one day, I can see them in the real world and not through a digital screen.”
On a different point:
“see (your new friends) in the real world”
I will say the same thing to you that I said to Irene in the Thursday class. The expressions “in real life” and “in the real world” raises an interesting issue. There is nothing wrong with what you have written.
However, you being under quarantine, you engaging in virtual learning, you sitting in your bedroom staring at a laptop and wondering when you will get to meet your new classmates… this IS real life!
People refer to it as “the new normal”. If it’s normal then it is real!
Therfore, calling offline activity “real life” or the “real world” – and insinuating that online life is somehow NOT real – seems to me to be a rather ironic thing to say… so, if it were me writing, I would put “the real world” in quotation marks to indicate that I have my tongue in cheek.
Hi everyone. My name is Adisty Cantika Paramadhina, people usually call me Adisty. I was born in Surabaya, on the 1st of September 2002. I currently live in Gresik but when people ask me where I come from, I usually just say that I’m from Surabaya because it’s less complicated to explain. I graduated from SMAN 1 Gresik. Even though I studied natural science for the three years I was in high school, I didn’t really see myself studying it for college. So, I decided to apply to the international undergraduate program of Universitas Gadjah Mada as an accounting major and luckily, I was accepted. Besides the IUP test, I also took the UTBK entrance exam. I didn’t really expect anything from it because I was locked in the public bathroom of the building where I took the UTBK test, exactly 20 minutes before I had to take it. As you could probably guess, my mood was ruined and I thought I did the test badly. But the results came out with good news. I was accepted at Universitas Airlangga (a university in Surabaya), on the accounting program as well. I was faced with two choices but in the end, I chose Universitas Gadjah Mada. The main reason why I wanted to study somewhere far from where I currently live is because I want to start fresh where I can hopefully meet new friends and learn new things in a new environment. This past week, I had my first classes as a university student and Mr. Adrian’s class was a nice little closing which made me feel confident that I made the right choice.
ReplyDeleteAdisty wrote:
Delete“My name is Adisty Cantika Paramadhina, people usually call me Adisty.”
You need either “but” or “and” after the comma.
You wrote:
“I decided to apply to the international undergraduate program of Universitas Gadjah Mada as an accounting major.”
[1] You should capitalize the “International Undergraduate Program” because that is its official name.
[2] “Universitas Gadjah Mada”: I will say the same thing to you as I said to another student: Gadjah Mada University should not be written as “University of Gadjah Mada” in English as that is not its official international name (in English). The official English name of “Universitas Indonesia” is “University Of Indonesia”. And for “Universitas Airlangga”, it is “Airlangga University”
You wrote:
“I didn’t really expect anything from it because I was locked in the public bathroom of the building where I took the UTBK test, exactly 20 minutes before I had to take it.”
To be honest, it’s not exactly clear what this anecdote about “public bathroom” is about. You had a stomach ache?
You wrote:
“I had my first classes as a university student and Mr. Adrian’s class was a nice little closing which made me feel confident that I made the right choice.”
[1] The cheque is in the post.
[2] I’ll say the same to you as I said to Gabriel in the Monday class (and perhaps one or two other students]. It’s OK to call me Adrian. If you want to be more formal, the correct way to do it is to call me Mr Coen (or Mr. Coen, with a full stop after “Mr”, in American English; we British usually omit the full stop).
“Mister” goes with the family name: in this case, “Coen”. No native English speaker (at least not from my own country) would connect “Mister/Mr” to my first name (“Adrian”).
And, whatever you do, you don’t call someone just “Mister” in English because, while it is an understandable mistake, it does noy sound nice, and if I ever called another British person (just) “Mister” without their family name, it would sound unfriendly or hostile.
Hey everyone! My name is Schalke Anindya Putri, and people usually call me Schalke. It is a German name, but unfortunately, I am not German; I was born in Jakarta, on 10 March 2002. If you are wondering where my parents got that name from, well, it is a German football club. When I was born, my dad was watching a football match between Schalke and Bayern Munchen, and he decided that I would be named after the team that won. Now, can you imagine if Munchen won instead? Anyways, I was raised in a quite multicultural environment. When I was 6 months old, my parents took me and my brother to live in China. As a result, I spent about 9 years of my life living in 3 beautiful cities in China; namely Guangzhou, Beijing, and Shanghai. Being a place where I had based a part of my childhood on had made its national language, Mandarin, as my first language. However, I no longer speak the language very fluently anymore because Bahasa Indonesia and English have pretty much dominated my life. As I entered fourth grade, my parents brought me back to Indonesia, specifically to Bekasi. I had an insanely hard time adapting, mainly due to the language barriers and cultural differences. With all the challenges that I’d overcome over the past years, I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate in Economics and the studies of its fields, which has brought me here to UGM to study Economics; particularly, for my vast interest in studying Development Economics (which may sound boring to alot of people). I love traveling, but the Covid-19 pandemic had crushed all my travel plans this year. A fun fact of mine is perhaps that I love occupying my free time with volunteering activities and community services. I also LOVE reading and watching Mystery books and movies; so if you have any recommendations, let me know! Thank you for keeping up with me :)
ReplyDeleteThis writing is very accurate and has good puntuation and word choice.
DeleteIf other EWS students who are also good writers feel jealous that I did not say this to you too, please remember that it does not mean that I think it.
Schalke wrote:
“It is a German name, but unfortunately, I am not German; I was born in Jakarta, on 10 March 2002.”
[1] This suggests that you wish you were German. Is it your intention to give your readers this impression?
[2] The semi colon is a nice touch. That is the correct way to use one.
You wrote:
“As a result, I spent about 9 years of my life living in 3 beautiful cities in China…”
It should be “nine” and “three”.
You wrote:
“I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate in Economics and the studies of its fields, which has brought me here to UGM to study Economics.”
[1] It should be “passionate about economics” and “economics” should not be capitalized. It is just a common noun unless you are talking explicitly about the official name of a course.
[2] The expression “and the studies of its fields” sounds awkward. Perhaps this is better: “I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate about economics and studies in that field.”
[3] You can avoid the repetition of “economics” (it’s always good practice to reduce repetition and redundancy) in this way; compare yours to mine:
“I have grown to become a young adult who is incredibly passionate about economics and and studies in that field, which has brought me here to UGM to study it as my major.”
You wrote:
“I also LOVE reading and watching Mystery books and movies; so if you have any recommendations, let me know!”
The word “mystery” should not be capitalized.
Have you watched Colombo?
Hi friends! My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be referred as Alya. I was born on 17 July 2002 and I think that I am the perfect embodiment of Cancer, the zodiac. I am majoring in Management and this major is far different from what I intended to take initially. I have always been fascinated by genes and viruses all throughout high school. This fascination led me to a seat in Biomedical Engineering in the University of Manchester. I was supposed to go there until I had a heartfelt conversation with my mother and she managed to convince me to attend a whole different major in a whole different place. I am really glad with the decision I made though, it has barely been a month but I know that I love it already.
ReplyDeleteI liked writing. I used to write excerpts and proses and I would post them in an Instagram account throughout my last two years in high school. I used to find writing very relaxing and enjoyable but it has been really stressful since I got a writer’s block six months ago. I am looking forward to the day I can write just like how I used to. Besides writing, I enjoy reading scientific journals as well as novels and “self-help” books. Additionally, I might sound like a little kid but I still enjoy Disney movies and I always watch them when I’m feeling extremely sad and blue. Lastly, I really enjoy watching F1 with my boyfriend on race weekends. I love rooting for the underdogs even though it might seem silly. Feel free to talk with me if any of you like F1 too!
Alya wrote:
Delete“My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be referred as Alya.”
[1] Supposing “referred” was the right word choice, then it would have to have the preposition “to” after it (“My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be referred to as Alya.”). However, I would suggest that this is preferrable: “My name is Rachma Alya but I prefer to be called Alya.” The word “referred to” works better with titles. “My name is Gerald Mortimer, but I prefer to be reffered to as Captain Mortimer,”
You wrote:
“This fascination led me to a seat in Biomedical Engineering in the University of Manchester.”
We get “a seat” in or at political institutions. We get “a place” at university.
You wrote:
“I was supposed to go there until I had a heartfelt conversation with my mother and she managed to convince me to attend a whole different major in a whole different place. I am really glad with the decision I made though, it has barely been a month but I know that I love it already.”
This is very intriguing. I will ask you about it at some point in the future.
Hello everyone! My name is Vania Nabillah Ramadhani, but you can simply call me Vania. I currently live in East Jakarta, and I have been living here for the past five years. A little fun fact about me, is that I’m actually Cirebonese, but I have never lived in Cirebon. I was born in Magetan, a small city in East Java back in 2002. Not long after, I moved to Yogyakarta and lived there for around 4 years. Then I moved to Australia for a year, and settled back in Magetan for around six months. Afterwards, I moved yet again to Lembang, Bandung when I was in 4th grade. I went back to Magetan again and called it home for the next three years before coming to Jakarta. Yes, I moved quite a lot. It was pretty fun but also challenging. Now, talking about my hobbies, I like to read books and the one that I’m currently reading is Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom. However, I’ve been limiting the amount of books to read ever since class started. I also like to swim, but sadly this pandemic is forcing me to hold back for a few months. My previous school, SMAN 67 Jakarta once held this event where all of the seniors would talk about their universities. I actually decided to study in Gadjah Mada University because of this event. One of my senior talked about the IUP program and I was intrigued. So, here I am now, studying economics in Gadjah Mada University. I’m super excited to study here and to meet new friends.
ReplyDeleteVania wrote:
Delete“A little fun fact about me, is that I’m actually Cirebonese, but I have never lived in Cirebon.”
I thought to myself, the “Cirebonese” people? Well, I don’t know anything about them, so I looked it up. And this is what wiki told me:
“The Cirebonese or Cirebonese people are an Austronesian ethnic group and nation native on the city of Cirebon and its immediate surrounding area, located in the northern part of the island of Java in Indonesia. Numbering approximately 1.9 million, the Cirebonese are mostly Muslim. Their language, Cirebonese, is a mixture of Javanese and Sundanese, with a heavier influence from Javanese, and as such is variably classified as either a dialect of both of those languages or as an independent language.”
Vania, you might not be the first ever Cirebonese IUP student I have taught, but you are certainly the first one who has identified yourself as being one.
You wrote: “A little fun fact about me, is that I’m actually Cirebonese.”
Be careful. The subject here is the noun phrase “A little fun fact about me” and you cannot separate this from its verb which is “is”. So, no comma after “me”. The comma after “Cirebonese” is correct because the subject “I” makes “but I have never lived in Cirebon” an independent clause.
Hello to everybody who is reading this, let me introduce myself. My name is Gerald Ivan Dharmawan and you can call me Gerald. I have lived in Jakarta since the 28th of November on the year 2001. Well, that is also the date when I went out of my mothers womb. Currently, I live in Kelapa Gading with my parents, my older brother, and my little sister. Basically, My father works in a bank called Danamon, my mother is a housewife, My brother studies at Padjajaran University, and my sister is in primary school. I’m a middle child and I am enjoying it because I have the privilege of having both a bigger and younger sibling. Since kinder garden, I went to the same school that is Penabur because it is so near to my house. To give an example of how near it is, it took me 5 minutes to walk from my house. I love doing sports on my leisure time but, I’m slacking a little bit since the pandemic because I the park near my house is closed. So, as a substitute, i basically do no sporty activities and I love scrolling through my phone till midnight.
ReplyDeleteAs the reason right now I am writing this, I am studying Accounting at Gadjah Mada University or we usually say UGM. To be honest, UGM is not my first priority of college that I planned to attend. But, I’m not pissed for the fact that I wasn’t accepted at my first priority college because I also realized that I want to study in Yogja, the city that is known as the city for students. Also, UGM is currently ranked numbe one in Indonesia and who doesn’t want to study there. IUP UGM is my first international school that I attend and I am shocked because of the fact that everybody here is so fluent at Speaking English. I think it will take a while till I get used to all of this. In conclusion, I hope we could meet on the second semester and I could feel the vibes of becoming a part of UGM
Gerald wrote:
Delete“I have lived in Jakarta since the 28th of November on the year 2001.”
Yes. That is the date of your birth. This is an interesting way of expressing this information. Do remember, however, that it should be “in” and not “on” the year 2001 and also remember that the expression “In the year 1999…” (and similar) is very formal and usually only used in declarations or formal announcements. The way you use it here, though, is nice because it is mildy humorous.
Hi, all! I am Shalsadilla Nadya Prameswary. People are always confused whether they want to call me Shalsa, Dilla, or Nadya but honestly I prefer to be called Nadya. I live in Yogyakarta for my whole life since 20th of July 2002 which is the day when I was born. I graduated from SMA N 8 Yogyakarta which is a public school, so I barely use English in my daily life before I entered IUP Class in UGM. I really enjoy being involved in social activities, organizing events, and many more. I do love meeting people and have such social interaction, but since I am an introvert (INFP-T) I need more time to adapt and time to ‘recharge’ my energy after meeting a lot people. My hobbies are baking, playing musics, and traveling! Since I live in Yogyakarta for 18 years, if you want to stroll around the city and look for interesting places here, don’t hesitate to contact me!
ReplyDeleteNadya wrote:
Delete“I live in Yogyakarta for my whole life since 20th of July 2002 which is the day when I was born.”
[1] It should be “I have lived in Yogyakarta…”. We know this is usually the correct grammar when it is followed by “for” + an amount of time or “since” + a date, time or event in the past.
[2] Compare yours to mine:
“I have lived in Yogyakarta since 20th of July 2002 which was the day when I was born.”
Take note of the changes I have made.
Hi, everyone. My name is Tallulah Humaira Ihsan – Lulu for short. I turned eighteen this year on the fifteenth of August. I was born, raised, and currently am in Jakara. Having lived in the same city my entire life, it’s safe to say I’m quite nervous about moving to another city where I’ll be all alone. Though despite the nerves, the excitement is definitely there as well. Yogyakarta is a city well known for its rich cuisine and culinary treats, which is really thrilling since I’m a huge foodie! I have a food blog on Instagram which I post on just for fun, though it really warms my heart when people actually message me asking for restaurant and food recommendations. I studied science in high school because my mom kind of drilled into my mind that I wanted to study medicine, and I really thought I did. However, nearing the time when university entrance exams were about to happen, I realized that I couldn’t imagine myself slaving over thousand-page textbooks day and night, studying corpses, and memorizing the Latin names of all the 200-something bones in a human body for, give or take, seven years, only for me to become a general practitioner! So, here I am now, studying at the Faculty of Economics and Business of Gadjah Mada University. I hope to meet everyone in person as soon as possible, but as of now, I do believe that this semester being held online is the wisest choice for all of us.
ReplyDeleteLulu wrote:
Delete“I was born, raised, and currently am in Jakara.”
This is a very interesting sentence: the way you have used “am” and not repeated the pronoun “I”. It sounds a little bit idiosyncratic but I don’t think it’s wrong. It’s unusual to encounter the verb “am” separated from the subject “I”. So it’s OK. But if it made me (as a reader) stumble over it, then perhaps it detracts from the impact of the words. I suggest this instead:
“I was born, raised, and currently live in Jakara.”
Hello everyone! my name is Sarah Salsabila Umar but you can call me Sarah. My birthday is on 31 January 2002, so im currently 18 years old. I graduated from Tunas Muda School, which is an IB school located in West Jakarta. My high school life was full of tears and tons of assignment every single day. However, after 3 years of hard work i finally finished my high school with quite a satisfactory result. I was planning to go to Germany once i graduated since my older sister lives there and she thinks that the education in Germany is one of the best in the world. Therefore, i decide to apply to the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management and got accepted after 2 weeks of waiting for the results. I was happy that i got accepted but turns out my parents asked me to apply to a university in Indonesia and they suggested UGM, therefore i decide to take the test and also got accepted. It was a spontaneous decision.
ReplyDeleteSarah wrote:
Delete“My birthday is on 31 January 2002.”
No, it’s not. Your birthday WAS on 31 January 2002, while your birthday IS on 31 January. See what I mean?
You wrote:
“I was happy that I got accepted but turns out my parents asked me to apply to a university in Indonesia and they suggested UGM, therefore i decide to take the test and also got accepted.”
The prepostional verb “to turn out” needs a subject and for this particular verb the subject is very often simply “it”. Next, you are telling the story in the past tense so it needs to be: “…it turned out my parents asked me to apply to a university in Indonesia.” (turned not turns.)
The same applies to the verb “decide” in the last part of the sentence; it needs to be past tense, as does “get” but you got that one right.
Hello! My name is Saidah Intan Indriati, but people usually call me Intan. I was born and raised in Tangerang and I graduated from BINUS SCHOOL Serpong this year after majoring in IT & Sociology. I have one older sister and she is 8 years older than me. I like cats, and I’m currently taking care of 5 at home. I decided to study Management in FEB UGM because I’ve always wanted to run my own business later in the future, and I want to equip myself with proper and sufficient knowledge before I do that. My hobbies include watching some TV series and cooking. Lately, I’ve been watching Archer on Netflix because I enjoy espionage-themed shows. And since I’m new at cooking, I’ve only been following really easy recipes on YouTube – but they have all been really great so far! Apart from watching movies and cooking, I also like to read fiction sometimes.
ReplyDeleteIntan wrote:
Delete“I graduated from BINUS SCHOOL Serpong this year after majoring in IT & Sociology.”
This does not sound right to my British ears; maybe it is an American thing? I don’t think the words “major” and “majoring” are appropriate for secondary education and are, in fact, the terminology of tertiary (higher) education and, indeed, only for undergraduates doing bachelor’s degrees (as opposes to master’s and doctrates).
This is a good, above average (for this IUP group) piece of writing, Intan. Well done. I could have said the same thing to others too, but – hey – you others out there whose ‘above-averageness’ I have not acknowledged, don’t be jealous.
Hello, everyone! My name is Pranaja Kresnaperdhana but I usually go by Naja for short. Currently I am living in Tangerang Selatan, Jakarta’s little less popular, but equally as crowded younger sister. I graduated from BINUS School earlier this year and right now, as you already know, I am going to Universitas Gadjah Mada for my higher education, majoring in management. I actually majored in science in my previous school because of my love for biology and mathematics. When I was little, I even wanted to be a vet. After I found out a degree in veterinary is not a piece of cake to get, I had to look for another major. I was thinking of a taking a specific course like event or fashion management, but I ended up choosing international management in UGM because of their dual degree program. I personally have a huge interest in music. I am not saying I’m talented in music or have a great taste in it, but I listen to music a lot. Plus, my ears are open wide for all kinds of music, so don’t hesitate to recommend me your favorite tunes. Country to K-Pop, Soul to Rap, I will listen to all of your inputs. Other than music, I am also addicted to podcasts. Though I consider myself new in the world of podcasts, I think whoever invented it was a genius. I usually listen to stories about criminology, paranormal experiences, or even unexplained mysteries before I go to bed. A common misconception about me is that people think that I’m not scared about thriller or horror stuffs. To be honest, I am terrified. But something about it keeps my adrenaline going. By the way, do not hesitate to greet me or follow me on social media. I would love to hear about all of you and your stories. I even referred to my self as a free on-call psychologist because my friends always look for me if they are having a problem, being indecisive or in need of an advice.
ReplyDeleteNaja wrote:
Delete“As you already know, I am going to Universitas Gadjah Mada for my higher education, majoring in management.”
[1] See what I said to Adisty further up the page.
[2] The sentence “I am going to Gadjah Mada University” probably works better after you are accepted and up until you arrive here. So, now that you are already here (so to speak), then “attending” should probably replace “going to”.
Hello everyone! My name is Sekar Pramesti Ratri Maheswari but you can just call me Sekar. I was born in Jakarta on 15th of September in 2002. I am a student from the Management Departement in Gajah Mada University and my dream is to become a marketing strategist at a startup company. I have one younger sister and her name is Laras and I am the oldest of two siblings. I have several reasons of why I decided to enroll to UGM in the first place. The first reason is because most of my families are alumnus of UGM, so I feel inspired by them. The second reason is because UGM is the best university of Indonesia according to the national statistics and also the Faculty of Economics and Business in UGM has been accredited by AACSB in 2014, so that’s saying something. And the last reason is because I love Jogja. My hometown is Jogja, so every Ramadhan and New Year’s Eve, I go there to visit my grandmother for 2 weeks. I just love the atmosphere. They’re just something that’s really enticing about that city. My main focus in my years as a university student is to grow and socialize more. I was a shy kid in high school and I just think that now is the time to turn things around. Now, we are young adults and not kids anymore. My plan in UGM is to have high GPAs so that I can enroll my double degree to study abroad. Beside that I would also like to contribute in many competitions and organizations, not only to have new experience but to also learn how to understand teamwork. My hobbies include traveling, watching movies, discovering new artists to listen to and socializing with my friends. I also love to review movies and then post them on my Instagram page dedicated for reviewing movies and random things that I like, more often that I do on my main Instagram page. My favorite movies are often my comfort movies. Movies that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand. I also like to watch tv shows in my free time and probably rewatch them until I get bored of them (which rarely happens). Some of which include, The Politician, Glee and the 100. All in all, I love many things including studying and just being myself. I really hope that I can be a great student and learn more things in UGM.
ReplyDeleteAnother above average piece. Well done.
DeleteBut I WILL find something to grumble about.
Let me see.
You wrote:
“My favorite movies are often my comfort movies. Movies that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand.”
Almost 35% of the first 10 words of the above quote are the word “movies”! The repetition makes it slightly clumsy. Actually, I now see that the word “movies” also occurs three times in the previous couple of sentences. So let’s have a look at a bigger excerpt of text:
You wrote:
BEFORE: “My hobbies include traveling, watching movies, discovering new artists to listen to and socializing with my friends. I also love to review movies and then post them on my Instagram page dedicated for reviewing movies and random things that I like, more often that I do on my main Instagram page. My favorite movies are often my comfort movies. Movies that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand.” Compare my version to yours:
AFTER: “My hobbies include traveling, watching movies, discovering new artists, and socializing with my friends. I also love to write about movies and then post my reviews on my Instagram page dedicated to such things, whereas random things that I like, more often, I post on my main Instagram page. My favorite movies are the ones I think of as my “comfort movies”; those that have aesthetically pleasing cinematographies and stories that are easy to understand.”
[1] The words “to listen to” (after “new artists “) seemed redundant to me.
[2] Notice the ‘Oxford comma’ I inserted.
[3] My edits are ideas related to style and smoothness and are not meant to be seen as me pointing out errors.
Good afternoon everyone! In this opportunity that Mr. Adrian gave me, please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Aisyah Afifah Darmawan, but you can call me Afi. If I’m being honest here, I don’t really like my first and middle name. The first one is just too heavy for me, too many obligations to deserve the name of Muhammad’s youngest wife. My middle name just sounds very Arabic. Not trying to be such a nationalist, but I just feel like it would be better if my parents gave me a local name. So, I go with Afi everywhere. I like that name and some people said that it suits my personality very well. For your information, my Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality is ENFP-A. I just got that result like three days ago, so it is pretty much valid.
ReplyDeleteI was born in Jakarta, April 17th 2002. It may be too much information, but my birth time is 11 PM. In case anyone wants to check my astrology birth chart or even primbon. I went to a three different school when I was kindergarten, but I don’t think you need to know the name of the schools. Please note that I move out a lot. No offense for Jakarta citizens, but your city just won’t stop flooding. I went to SDIT Auliya for my primary education, it is located near Bintaro Jaya. After that I continued my education at Labschool Kebayoran Junior High School. I love my junior high school life and Labsky really mold my way of thinking. For my high school education, my parents put me in an Islamic boarding school called SMAIT Asy-Syifa. It is located in Subang, Jawa Barat. Even though I drop myself out from there, I really appreciate what Asy-Syifa taught me, mostly about life skill and how to not become a crybaby. I went to SMAN 2 Tangerang Selatan for my 11th and 12th grade. Many things happened in my school life, some of them are life-changing events. So, that’s all, thank you for your time.
Afi wrote:
Delete“In this opportunity that Mr. Adrian gave me, please allow me to introduce myself.”
See what I said to Adisty further up the page.
You wrote:
“If I’m being honest here…”
Gosh, Afi. “If”?? Well, I would expect nothing less than 100% honesty on the EWS blog!
You wrote:
“For your information, my Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality is ENFP-A. I just got that result like three days ago, so it is pretty much valid.”
Can this be done online? If so, please send a link and I will make a blog entry about it. It could be fun.
You wrote:
“Please note that I move out a lot. No offense for Jakarta citizens, but your city just won’t stop flooding.”
See https://tinyurl.com/y45xqzxj
Hello there ! My name is Benedictus Hanzen Kurniawan, I was born on the 3rd of November 2001, i am the second of two children. My sister is 6 years older than me and she is a doctor and planting to become an Orthopedist. Currently i enrolled in the Faculty of Economics and Business IUP UGM with the major of Acccounting, but fun fact in the beginning before Covid -19 hits I was planning to go to Tilburg University in the Netherlands to pursue my Econometrics degree but because of Covid – 19 in March they cancelled my application because there was no UN ( Ujian Nasional ) and so I quickly decided to apply to UGM IUP so in the future I can have a chance to pursue my dream to study in Netherlands at Erasmus University. I chose accounting because at first I was quite confuse with what major do I take, and after quite substansial time of searching I decided to choose Accounting for me to take. I choose accounting because I want to pursue and challenge myself to be an accountant and many people often told me that accounting is a hard material to learn but after reading the material and so on I think accounting is a skill that everyone should have even at the most basic level to understand and because of that I choose to apply at FEB IUP UGM and UGM is the best university in Indonesia.
ReplyDeleteHanzen wrote:
Delete“Currently i enrolled in the Faculty of Economics and Business IUP UGM with the major of Acccounting.”
[1] You should have a comma after “currently”.
[2] Capitalize “I”
[3] “the major of Acccounting” should be “in accounting” (small “a” for accounting and the preposition is “in” and not “of”)
[4] Elsewhere Econometrics and Accounting should start with small letters.
You wrote:
“I chose accounting because at first I was quite confuse with what major do I take, and after quite substansial time of searching I decided to choose Accounting for me to take.”
Compare your to mine:
“I chose accounting because, at first, I was quite confused about what major to take, and after quite substantial time spent searching, I decided on accounting.”
Consider why I made each of my edits (including a spelling correction).
Greetings everyone! My name is Qeyra Noer Aumara Arsyi. My original nickname is Arsyi but a bit of an identity change might be a good start of my college live so please, call me Mara instead. I was born on November 1st 2001 in Surabaya, but never actually experienced living there. So no, I don’t claim myself as an east-Javanese. In fact, I don’t claim myself as any of Indonesian ethnic-tribe or whatsoever, although both my parents actually grew up in east java. My dad works as a banker so we constantly move from town to town in approximately every two years. I have lived in ten different cities and gone to nine different schools ever since I was born and that’s on struggling with identity crisis.I currently live at Cirebon and have just graduated from SMA Negeri 2. A lot has happened here since this is the longest period of time I’ve spent living in one city. I joined a debate team, had my first band and performed on a lot of event, broke some rules as well along the way but all the ups and downs kind of change me into a whole new person. UGM is a huge miracle for I have never thought that aiming for it is a realistic dream, let alone being accepted in IUP. I have never even gone to a proper English course so what you are reading right now is pure YouTube and subtitled movies product of a skill . But then again self-doubting isn’t an option anymore because now that I am here, it means I deserve it and all I have to do is prove that I am meant to be here. All that being said, please help me developing my lame skill sir Adrien, I am in desperate need of help.
ReplyDeleteMara wrote:
Delete“My original nickname is Arsyi but a bit of an identity change might be a good start of my college live so please, call me Mara instead.”
The comma needs to be after “life” (not “live”).
You wrote:
“I joined a debate team, had my first band and performed on a lot of event, broke some rules as well along the way but all the ups and downs kind of change me into a whole new person.”
Compare yours to mine:
“I joined a debate team, and I had my first band which performed at a lot of events. I broke some rules as well along the way but all the ups and downs have kind of changed me into a whole new person.”
Take note of the changes I have made and consider why I did them.
You wrote:
“A bit of an identity change might be a good start of my college live” and “I broke some rules, as well, along the way” and “all the ups and downs have kind of changed me into a whole new person”.
This is intriguing.
My name is Radhi Rijal Muliarto and I am an alumni of Sekolah Highscope Indonesia. People usually call me Radhi. I am doing well academically and socially active in organizations. I may consider myself a self-motivated learner and is open to new perspectives and views. In school, I participated in committees such as our school’s Model United Nation (HSMUN) and is organizationally active in attending futsal and basketball extracurricular. Economics has always intrigued me, particularly the economics of a certain country. Every country has its own strategies on how to boost their economy. This curiosity on how different countries run their economy has led me to make a mini thesis in my senior year in highschool. The title of the thesis is Docking Sector Is the Future of Indonesia’s Economy. This thesis discusses how Indonesia could boost its economy and be one the most influential country in the world by improving its docking system and international trade. This thesis is a stepping stone for me to expand my curiosity to other economics ideas. In my free time I like to hang out with my family and friends, either its getting dinner or just hanging out in a coffee shop. When I'm stressed out sports is my therapy. Sport is something for me to escape from the real world and just enjoy the moment. Anyway nice meeting all of you I hope we can be friends from having this English class together.
ReplyDeleteRadhi wrote:
Delete“In my free time I like to hang out with my family and friends, either its getting dinner or just hanging out in a coffee shop.”
You don’t need “its” and, even if you did, it would be “it’s”!
You wrote:
“Economics has always intrigued me, particularly the economics of a certain country. Every country has its own strategies on how to boost their economy.”
Compare yours to mine:
“Economics has always intrigued me, particularly the systems in specific countries, each of which has its own strategies on how to boost its economy.”
Hello everyone! My name is Manuel Reinhart Garcia Pasaribu, but you can call me Reinhart. I turned eighteen this year on the seventh of August. I was born and grew up in Depok, I’ve lived here my whole life. It is safe to say that I don’t like to leave this city just because I want to get enrolled in a university, but because it is the only choice I have. You might ask “why it is my only choice?” that is a good question you have there, so let me tell you my story. I was not a diligent student when I was in the third grade of high school, because of that my parents put me into some learning course. The learning course was fine, but the assignment they gave was too many that it got my school’s assignment forgotten. So, I had a plan to make my life easier, I started to skip the course’s class, procrastinated all the assignments, and enjoy my free day as a normal student. Of course, this plan didn’t last long enough until my parents found out that I was skipping the classes. From there everything went downhill, I got dropped out from the learning course and my parents lose their hope on me. I know this was all my fault but at that time I planned an act of revenge for the company of the course by using UGM’s IUP, so I can get enrolled faster than their students. I studied all day just to prepare for the test and to prove to my parents that I didn’t need a learning course to get enrolled in a university. When it was the day of the test, I feel very confident about my chances of getting enrolled and it was true I got accepted in UGM. Do you know what I did after that? I showed the result to the chairman of Depok’s course and it shocked all the teachers and even my friends. They still can’t believe that a procrastinator can achieve something like UGM’s IUP. Even my parents still felt super happy for me. Well, that is my journey to achieve UGM and I hope that I won’t be a procrastinator in UGM because I want to make my parent’s dream come true. So yeah thank you for reading my story and please Mr. Adrian teach me anything about writing skills because it is a very useful skill to have when I go abroad.
ReplyDeleteWhat an enjoyable story you have told, Reinhart. You have made your flaws and weaknesses sound very interesting! And the writing is pretty good too. However, I have run out of time. Next week I will START out by commenting on your writing before I look at anyone else’s.
Delete