thanks Sharon! for the Pic!!

So I've technically graduated, but with graduation comes a whole spew of responsibilities. Ever heard the story of exponential growth? There was a king who agreed to playing a chess match with another king from a rival kingdom. For every match that was lost, the losing king would, according to the number of squares found on the chessboard put two grains of rice and the number of grains of rice would double for each match and each square. In the end the king lost and bankrupted his kingdom, for the grains of rice grew exponentially- starting off small in the beginning but escalating to large amounts in the end. Well, what has exponential growth got to do with graduation? Let's just say that with graduation comes the credit letters from the banks demanding payment for the tuition fee loan.

Assuming that I owe the bank $9264.00, an interest rate of 1% will commence (no wonder they call graduation commencement) beginning on the 1st of August 2008, for every month, until the loan is paid off. Let's just say that I can only start repaying the loan in January next year, as finances would technically be more stable then. In the second month, I would owe the bank (including interest) need to pay off $9450.20, in the third, $9544.70, the fourth, $9640.15, the fifth, $9736.55, the sixth, $9833.95 and finally in the seventh month, when I actually do start paying off the loan, I would be paying off a loan of $9932.30!!! *falls off chair* See how quickly the amount has ballooned up? If I choose a monthly option of say $500 per month, I would technically be paying off interest, and only interest in the first half of the year. This is not to say that interest doesn't cease, in that sense interest is always a permenent liability. *sigh* it looks like I will be eating grass and only grass for the next couple of years.