I was in the UK from 14th to 20th July for my Cardiff University graduation ceremony.
Both me and Aliaa completed our postgraduate studies in September 2012. Subsequently we left the UK and came back to Malaysia. It wasn’t that long ago, but I was still pleased to see the capital of Wales. We had lots of good memories here.
Tuesday, 16 July 2013
We had 2 graduation ceremonies on 16th July: my MBA ceremony at 10AM, and Aliaa’s Msc ceremony at 4PM.
Early in the morning, I collected my pre-booked graduation robe at City Hall. The dress and the photography services were handled by Ede & Ravenscroft. Established in 1689, it’s the oldest tailor in London!

The ceremony started at 10AM. The Cardiff University ceremony is unique in the sense that important declarations are performed in both Welsh and English. And apart from that, there were no scrolls given out (compared to my undergraduate graduation at Monash University in Melbourne). Graduates walk up to the Vice Chancellor and shake her hand. After the hand shake, the Vice Chancellor would read a declaration (in Welsh) to officially recognise the students.

My parents were there at my graduation. I was really happy they came. Finally they get to visit Cardiff and see the capital of Wales. It was a bright sunny day so we were able to take lots of nice photos.

Later, Aliaa collected her graduation robe and we took a nice photo in front of the City Hall.

There was an MBA cocktail reception that afternoon. I met my old classmates, Chris (left), Miguel (middle) and other MBA friends. It was really good to see all of them there. Most of them have started working at big corporations, while some started their own businesses. Good to see everybody is doing well!

After the cocktail, I took my family for a tour around Cardiff, and showed them the university campus. From the Cardiff main building, we walked to the business school. There, I found out construction has started for the new building.
The 3D model, shown in the nearby Aberconway Building, looks really good. Very impressive design. I could see the construction site behind the existing Julian Hodge Building. I’m guessing the building will be ready in about 2 years from now. Maybe in my future visit to Cardiff, I’ll be able to visit the completed building!
That evening, my family left and went back to London. Their flight back to Kuala Lumpur departs the following day. As for me and Aliaa, we went to London the following day for the start of our honeymoon. We were in London for a few days (Link: part 1, part 2), and after that went to Italy for 1 week. To read about our Italy trip, click here.
For other MBA related posts, refer to the links below: