During my time at Bristol University (circa 1994 – 1997), the first year’s result didn’t count towards the final result. All we had to do was pass. Naturally, I did just that. By the skin of my arse, of course. I did the absolute minimum that I braced my parents for the possibility that I might have miscalculated my lack of effort and fail my first year. Thankfully, that did not happen.

In my first year, I had grown close to CS Lim, a Singaporean who stayed at Baddock Hall. We hung out together frequently with a few other Malaysians who eventually were my housemates when we moved to High Kingsdown. CS Lim was ambitious, kiasu and boastful. But he had the goods to back it up. He had an impressive array of accomplishments. Although, I initially and instantly disliked him, we ended up fast friends..

I credit him with being instrumental in instilling confidence in my intellectual abilities and values to the point that I believed I had it in me to achieve a first class, despite my reservations and a history of no academic accomplishment. I look back at that time as a time of madness. Up to that point, I was never a top ten student in primary, secondary or college. I was not a straight-A student. I had not distinguished myself academically or intellectually. I had not won any prizes, not even those throwaway ones. I was not eligible for any scholarships. CS Lim, however, was bursting with As and accomplishments. I felt we were black and white on that front.

At the start of the second year, we made a pact to work together so we would both graduate with a first class. Since CS Lim was the more experienced at such matters of accomplishment, he dictated the strategy, schedule and work load. I simply followed. Though we were a two-man team, I felt like his sidekick. He took the heavier load, but it was no less intense for me.

The first phase was to clear the official reading list as quickly as possible. To achieve that we skipped most of our lectures. I had a friend record most of the lectures on tape which I transcribed and then shared with CS Lim. Instead of the attending them, we spent our time going through the official reading list as quickly as we could. We divided the list and prepared summaries and exchanged them. After that, we went through the law journals in our library to find articles and cases not on it.

We attended our tutorials because missing two in a row would result in us being hauled up for an explanation. We did all our tutorial assignments together. We prepared our respective drafts separately, exchanged them to be critiqued then honed them before handing them in. Whilst I transcribed and summarised, CS Lim hired one of our lecturers for one-on-one private tutorials. He recorded those sessions and shared the recordings with me to listen and learn. They were incredibly intense. The private tutorial wasn’t simply a lecture on the law but like a viva on whatever topic they focused on for that session. CS Lim had to prepare intensely for it.

The second phase was going beyond the official reading list and our university.

Once we exhausted that, we headed over to the University of West England (UWE), the other university in Bristol, to raid its library. We did not just go through their textbooks and journals, summarising everything we came across, we also discovered essays prepared by Masters and Doctorate students. If we ran out of library time, we photocopied anything that looked remotely interesting to haul back to our rooms to consider and summarise.

After we cleared UWE, CS Lim bought us day passes at the Bodleian library at Oxford University to see what we could find. We made a day trip there arriving first thing in the morning and left when it closed. We spent the first half of the day sifting and identifying the journals, textbooks and papers we wanted. The second half was spent photocopying and summarising as much as we could. We spent the next couple of weeks reading and summarising our photocopied booty. We did this for all the subjects we took and spent a huge amount on photocopying.

The third phase was revising all the material we had summarised, writing practice essays, and reviewing them until the exams.

Despite both of us being avid tennis players, and playing frequently in our first year, that took a back seat. The second year saw us balloon in size because we were partial to Coke, which we drank like water (I had a few cartons in my wardrobe, which we shared), and instant noodles, which we relished. Although we had our moments of fun, a lot of our time was spent either in libraries or in his room or mine reading, summarising or working on tutorial assignments. I had never studied and worked so hard for my studies.

When the finals arrived, I had never been so prepared for an exam in my life.

However, despite our efforts, my overall grades for second year were only a second upper. I scored a strong second upper (60 – 70 marks) for three of my subjects but a weak second lower (50 – 60 marks) for one of them. I was disappointed. But CS Lim was more disappointed. Overall, he scored a second lower. Inexplicably, he scored a second lower for three subjects and only one second upper. Neither of us achieved a first class for any of our subjects. We expected, at least, to score the same. I was thoroughly perplexed how I ended up scoring higher than he did. If at all, I felt he should have gotten the higher grade, not me. In any event, we were both thoroughly disappointed with the results given our immense efforts.

When we returned for our third year, we reaffirmed our pact to go for a first. I wondered how CS Lim would do it since he had a second lower. I was closer to it than he was. There was still a lot of work to do for both of us. We doubled down on our efforts and worked harder than we did in our second year right off the bat.

However, three months in, amidst the reading, summarising, memorising and essay writing, I had those what-the-hell-am-I-doing moments when I critically reflect on why I did what I was doing. It was like a moment of shining clarity a drunk has amidst his inebriation. It happens for me for everything I do at some point. It started with the realisation that as exhilarating and fun as it was in the second year, I tired of the relentless study. I wanted more fun out of my short time there. I had only six months left. I also wondered at the value of getting a first since I was going to work for my father. My employment was assured, I didn’t have to impress anybody to get a job. All I needed was a second upper for my MARA loan to be converted into a scholarship.

Those realisations made me abandon my ambitions for a first. There was more to life than that. I was worried CS Lim would be upset about my decision but he took it well and persevered with his efforts. I saw him less and infrequently, although he would burst into my room occasionally to run an argument or to enlighten me about his recent efforts. I continued my studies but did so moderately. After a full gallop in my second year and a touch of my third, I happily cantered to the finish line that was my third year exams.

CS Lim, however, accomplished the extraordinary. He scored a first. He scored so high for his final five subjects that it pulled up his average into a first. I heard it mentioned, and I am happy to stand corrected, he was the first person in Bristol University to make the leap from a second lower to a first class for law. It was an amazing accomplishment and one fully deserved.

After we graduated, I returned to Malaysia to complete my local bar exams, known as the Certificate of Legal Practice (CLP) at University of Malaya, and practised law at my father’s firm. CS Lim did not practice and went into finance.

If I had to do my undergraduate degree all over again, knowing what I know, and money were not an issue, I would live it up for the full three years and return with a third class. For all my efforts at securing a good academic pedigree and good grades, once I began, no one cared for any of it. Hardly any clients asked me which university I graduated from or what grades I got. The most they asked was, ‘So you studied law in UK is it?’ and upon hearing my answer remark, ‘Yah, UK is good.’ We would then discuss their matter. The truth is nobody cares about the paper once we have it.

I had a fellow Malaysian who graduated with a third class. It did not hamper her career in anyway. She grew to become a formidable and respected construction law litigator with her own practice. And construction law is a heavily technical area of litigation.

Our formal education merely gets our foot in the door, but it does not open it. What gets it open is what we can do for others. And you do not need a first class or even a second upper for that. Even a third class works.

What we need to be once we enter the world of employment is indispensable.

We don’t need a first class for that.

And a first class is no guarantee of that either.