“Every time I see a machine, I want to open it up and know how...

“Every time I see a machine, I want to open it up and know how it works. I’ve wanted to be an engineer since childhood. I was planning to study mechanical engineering at a specific university, and I was quite confident that I’d get accepted into the school. But my application was rejected. It was devastating. I was at a friend’s house when I found out. Both of us applied, so we checked our results at the same time, but only she was accepted. I went straight home and cried. I didn’t talk to my friends for months. I know that worse things happen to people, but it was a big deal for me. I felt like I’d lost my chance to be somebody. That was three years ago. Now I’m about to graduate from a different school. It took some time, but I ended up making the best of the situation. I’m getting a degree in computer science. It might not be mechanical engineering, but it’s engineering. Every machine needs a computer. So I’m proud of how things turned out. I didn’t get my exact dream, but I made the best of my remaining options.”

(Dhaka, Bangladesh)