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Interested in tech since day one.

From young, I've always been fascinated at how technology shapes our lives.

Pre-education

It all began in a little interest in understanding how my family's computer worked. The Internet was a scary place for small me then; I spent most of my time away from it and instead spent time exploring the computer. I spent a lot of time seeing how the computer worked, which built the foundation for where I am today.

Early education

Joining kindergarten, I had so much to learn and share. I was the (not so small) kid who would always get excited at the introduction of new things to try.

Primary school

Every trip to the computer lab seemed like paradise to me, and it didn't take long before I managed to get weekly access to the lab by joining the school's ICT Club.

Thanks to my experience in the early days, I blazed through content and managed to pick up things efficiently.

"[Arash] is skilled in Information Technology and loves to share his knowledge with his peers whenever there are IT lessons."

Extracted from a teacher comment

Secondary school

If you were to ask me if secondary school was the most impactful time of my life, I'd strongly agree. Since joining secondary school, a whole lot of new experiences exposed me to have hands-on experience with code.

Most of my skills come from here — I've participated in programmes, joined hackathons, and met so many friends who share the same and more elaborate dreams as I do.

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Thinking and learning my way.

Over the years, I've adapted five constant but interdependent values — I like to call them my "core values".

Even though there may be slight additions or variations, the concept behind each value is never lost.

💞 Care

Serious attention or consideration applied to doing something correctly or to avoid damage or risk.

Even though the dictionary definition specifies 'damage' and 'risk', I don't only care for tasks or handling work. Caring for people is equally, if not more, important than that. My personal definition of care includes:

Care for others

A definite top priority, caring for others is the most important of the 'care' factor — simply, you can't establish a good relationship without caring. To me, caring means more than just keeping close contact; it's also understanding another person, and seeing what I can contribute to have a meaningful relationship.

Care for work and responsibilities

Prioritising care for work and responsibilities is also essential, besides the people aspect. By caring for my work and responsibilities, I handle all my tasks effectively, efficiently, and successfully; during challenging times, I'll make it an effort to try to find ways to resolve the problem.

Care for self

It starts with yourself: you can't establish caring for others if you don't start to care for yourself. That's why I also take up the challenge to continue caring for myself, by inspiring and motivating through rough moments to keep myself optimistic.

🤝 Respect

Due regard for the feelings, wishes, or rights of.

In all my school experience, respect has been the value that's been the hardest to show. It often lacks in many nowadays, and many also tend to misinterpret respect. My personal definition of respect covers:

Respect for others

Respect is a chain that establishes and sustains relationships. By showing respect, you acknowledge someone else's identity, voice, and opinion by allowing them to share, convey, and elaborate.

Respect for opinions

Not everyone will have the same opinion as me, since everyone has their own points of view. I won't disregard anyone just for having conflicting views. No exceptions.

🗂 Responsibility

The state or fact of being accountable or to blame for something.

Responsibility is a task that many seem to struggle with — even I do at times. However, I can't and won't let stressful moments break me from being responsible for tasks; be it homework or projects, I try my best to persevere and fulfil the responsibility provided to me.

💪 Perseverance

Persistence in doing something despite difficulty or delay in achieving success.

I don't put down quickly when stress comes in. I tend to find positives among negative situations to make myself gear up and prepare for the worse better.

I also utilise methods of reflection to make sure that I internalise, process, and understand why things happen the way they do — and what I can do moving forward from a negative experience.

🧠 Integrity

The quality of being honest and having strong moral principles or the state of being whole and undivided.

I find the definition of integrity interesting; that's why I've decided to take in both definitions and compartmentalise them through different segments:

Integrity of mental health

We are in an age where it has never been so easy to break down from stress, pressure, and hardships. I've learnt the importance of establishing mental integrity, to make sure that I don't break when reaching rock bottom.

Integrity of emotions

Sharing feelings can be challenging, especially when it's crossing into the boundary of a sensitive topic. Despite so, I'll try to make it essential that my emotions are never compromised.

Integrity of opinion

Having an opinion is something that I still need to work on; most of the times, I'll take up and remain in a neutral stance, but I'll try to express my opinions where due.

Transparency.

Transparency can be difficult in some cases. Even so, I'll try to be as truthful as I can, being transparent in everything that I do. It's still something I need to work towards — ideal transparency — but I'm getting there!