Chapter 78 – How to be an Engineer?
I'm not good at math, and I prefer using a calculator even for simple arithmetic. I'm also not a technical person. Cars and motorcycles were only an interest during my childhood days; I liked drawing them back then. Today, I prefer to walk and take public transport, even amid the chaos that our government officials will never experience. Because it's the system they created for the nation they never loved.
Electronics and Communications Engineering sounds good on paper. After more than a decade, I've already forgotten even the basics of what I learned. A review would surely help reopen it, but it'll take time to remember everything. The good thing is that the day job I have is still close to the engineering degree I chose when I entered college back in 2006.
One of the descriptions my old man got from a colleague during his time in the Middle East: An engineer is someone who is near the engine and can take care of it. He worked in a machine shop, if you read the previous post. Engineering is a wide field and profession. It can relate to physical things that take up space in your home, and to things that don't take up literal space but still take up space in your brain and heart — digital stuff, everyone? I hope you get my point there.
Engineering is more than what Wikipedia or other sources on the Internet can define. There are engineers who don't act like one (even if they're licensed), and there are non-engineers (by profession) who act like one. You'll have a hard time telling them apart. Locally, a person who passes the national exam for a certain engineering field is entitled to add the word “engineer” to their name. Think of being knighted by the queen — you'll now be called “lord” or “sir.”
So what are engineers?
They are creatives with precision. Almost close to scientists, and both are nerds in their respective interests. Can we call them otakus? One good example is the field of space engineering. Shouting “to the stars and beyond” is not enough. One must think about how to get there — to the stars and beyond. And yes, we the human race started with Chinese fireworks, German rockets landing somewhere in the 1940s, American footprints on the moon, the International Space Station, and most recently, someone thought that we could also reuse rockets instead of letting them become space junk. Thanks, Elon — you're the best.
Now you know how and what engineers are, though I don't know if you're satisfied by that. You can engineer the answer and act like one. Design and creativity are both part of engineering. You can't remove one. Engineering is more than the numbers; as I said, it always goes beyond that. Sometimes it takes multiple suitcases so you can keep a ton of cash — cash that came from the taxpayers — so it can be yours. That's engineering.
Thank you for reading
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