Goodbye to January

January didn't seem long at all to me and it actually ran faster than I imagined. I had a couple of bad experiences last month and I guess it wasn't surprising to me because I saw them coming. The first one is not being able to meet up with my goals for January. I had a goal of getting a certain amount of Hive power (HP) by the end of January but I already knew I wouldn't hit that goal 2 weeks into the month. That realization reduced my morale for a while but I shook it off when I reminded myself that I made good progress, even though it wasn't up to the target I had in mind.

Also, getting HP isn't totally in my control, knowing that fact also made it easier to move forward. But, the one thing that is in my control is consistency; showing up every day on Hive and adding value to the platform in the form of quality engagement and posting good content daily. Yes, I did get the author of the month badge and I plan on getting the yearly badge as well, it's one of my goals for this year.

As for the very worst experience, that happened in the last few days of January. I graduated from the university last year October and everyone is mandated to go through the final clearance before the university will let you go. This is done to make sure you're not owing the university in any way, which means the clearance process is a very long one that involves every sector of the institution, starting with your department.

I started the clearance on Monday as early as 8 AM and I first went to the bank to make payments for the alumni and faculty clearance. Alumni and hostel clearance were easy, so I did those first and proceeded to one of the most stressful parts of the whole clearance process; department clearance. After making the payment, I was given the clearance form and I had to go meet all the staff in my department to get their signature. After several hours of going from office to office and also waiting for some of the staff to turn up, I managed to get 10 signatures, remaining 2; the two top professors of my department, a man and a woman.

A friend told me they would be available on Wednesday because they would be having a meeting in the morning, so I went to the University early on Wednesday to see if I could meet them before they ended up in the meeting. Unfortunately, both of them haven't arrived when I got to my faculty because I checked the car park and didn't see their cars. I went to a restaurant to eat and by the time I got back, I noticed the male professor's car in the car park but the meeting had already started.

Luckily, I met with the female professor on her way to the meeting and after greeting her, I told her I was on my way to her office to get her signature for my clearance. She told me to drop the form at the departmental office and she will sign it when she gets there 💔. I had no option but to wait for them to finish the meeting and I sat close to the car park waiting for the male professor because he has a habit of leaving meetings early and once he gets into his car, I won't see him again until another day.

After several hours, I saw the professor heading to his car and I managed to get his signature. I had just one more signature remaining, so I decided to just drop the form at the departmental office. After 2 hours, I went back to the office to check if she had signed it and luckily she has, and the secretary stamped it, signalling the end of the departmental clearance. I quickly hurried to the faculty office to begin the clearance before they closed for the day.

After checking all my documents to make sure everything was correct, I was given a form to fill and that was the end of it. I'm very glad that I’m done with that chapter of the clearance, and I got home around 5 PM, I basically spent most of my day in the university, just waiting for 2 professors to sign my clearance form. My legs still ache from all the walking around, and I still have to go start the other sections of the clearance next Monday

Thanks for reading

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