My name is Sin Yee. I'm a 23 years old Bioinformatics student, studying in Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. I am fortunate to maintain my CGPA at first class (3.97) because Bioinformatics is my passion. In this September, it will be my 7th semester in UTM in which starting from last semester we have to find a company/university for our internship placement. I choose to apply to different companies and universities, local and oversea and see whichever better will come to me.

Believe it or not, when I apply to do my research internship at University of Cambridge, I never thought of I will be accepted by Cambridge, because I am not confident that my achievements can get me an entrance ticket to Cambridge. Surprisingly, I got their email calling for an interview and everything seems to run smooth and I got their acceptance letter in May! Words could not describe my happiness because getting this entrance ticket means getting a learning opportunity from the experts in my research area as well as getting a better chance for studies after undergraduate.

The first thing I did was made a call to tell my parents (Since that time I was studying in Johor campus while my parents staying in Kuala Lumpur). I remember the first question my mother asked was: "How about the cost?". Deep in my heart, I know finance will be a big challenge since I only depend on PTPTN during my studies in UTM and the currency exchange rate of Ringgit Malaysia to UK dollars is very big. However, I do not want to give up easily so I told my mother that I will try to apply sponsorship from university, government and corporate companies. If after trying all these and I still can't get enough money, only then I find other possible internship.

Therefore, since May, I have contacted more than 1000 companies and organizations to inquire about sponsorship, I have sent almost uncountable emails to seek for sponsors. Unfortunately, most of the times I get negative responses:

1. We do not provide scholarship for short term study abroad.
2. All the sponsorships for this quarter have been given out.
3. The current economy is not good, so the budget has been cut down, we are only able to provide a small amount of money (less than RM2000).

Meanwhile, I worked during the 3 months before the expected departure date. Up until today, I have successfully saved money for basic expenses. (Flight ticket has been bought, and IELTS test has been paid.) I would like to thank the lecturers who had sponsored to me, without the money I hardly get money to register for IELTS test and buying flight ticket during the promotion period.

But challenges keep on coming, on the last day of July, I received a very bad news from the government department which originally promised to provide scholarship RM10,000 to cover my 5 months accommodation in Cambridge, they have to reduce the scholarship to me due to the cut down of budget allocation for study abroad.

Now, I left only one month to collect the remaining RM10,000 (£2000). I am very worried if I could not get enough money to provide proof to UK Immigration, therefore I choose to open up this crowdfunding page, hopefully with the little donation from a large number of people, the miracle can happen.

I MUST secured RM10,000 for accommodation to provide proof to UK Immigration.
Accommodation - RM10,075 (£400.00 per month)

This room is one of the cheapest rooms which are near to my research building, the information is provided by Cambridge Accommodation Office.