"Grrrrrrrrrr" the sound of my alarm woke me
up with such full force I fell out of my reading chair. Wait, reading chair? I
slept off on my... I took a quick look at my window. It was morning! How was
that possible?! Just ten minutes ago it was 2 am and I was struggling to
understand sacrotuberal ligament. How did this happen?! I looked at my watch to
confirm the sun had not decided to host a ‘fashion parade’ of itself at 2:10 am.
What I saw almost made me pass out again. It was 7:45 am! And I would have a
class by 8:00 am. Anatomy! Professor Olopade!
Summary: I am done for.
Even if I, with my as of yet,
undisclosed superhuman powers, manage to dress myself up in five minutes, I
still had to trek up from where I am currently squatting with my friend in
Ajibode to the bus stop—school halls have refused to start allowing stalites
move in, hustle for a cab with fellow Uites and if I'm lucky to get one within
ten minutes, then trek from the staff club—the bus stop closest to Anatomy—which
would take about five minutes, and get there to meet the door shut on me
anyway.
"What is it?! Why are
you disturbing me again this early morning?" My friend screamed. I had no
idea she'd screamed out in frustration. I looked at her with every intention of
apologizing, but then I thought; wait, “this babe still dey for bed, yesterday
she no get class, today na from 11-1”. It seemed impossible now that some
people had NORMAL schedules. I swallowed my apology with a hiss and ran to the
bathroom. “This one no fit know wetin dey do me.”
Miraculously, I got to the class 8:07am, some seconds
before Prof Olopade shut his door. Once in, I pretended to be engrossed in his
teaching while I was trying to revise my gross anatomy that I had last night
sadly slept on, in more ways than one, since I could see a trickle of dried
spit on one of the pages. Ugh! Okay, now, revision. What are the ligaments on
the pelvic girdle? Dorsal longitudinal, ventral longitudinal, sacrotuberal,
iliolumbar.. okay, where is dorsal found? Hmm.. hmm...
My course mate tapped me,
bringing me out of my reverie. "What?" I whispered to her, stealing a
glance at Prof Olopade and noticing that he and the entire class had their eyes
on me. Oh my God. I'd just been asked a question. Prof Olopade was kind enough
to repeat it. "Ayo, I asked, what are intercellular junctions?" His
voice had a deadly calm to it.
Inter what?! I stood up
looking as dumbfounded as I felt. Have I ever heard of that my whole life? Or
didn't I hear correctly? Anita was whispering something to me out of the corner
of her mouth but I couldn't really hear her. Did we do that this semester?
Thankfully, Prof called on another person and I was
saved from further embarrassment. Once down, I scanned my notes immediately. I
saw a whole page of the same topic. How come? Did I write this?! Well, perhaps,
because it was in my handwriting and it was my note, but still… I read this
note two days ago! Now I remember reading this last week, in preparation for
the test, which I mercilessly “banged,” by the way. How could I not have
remembered?! I was so depressed and disappointed in myself at that moment. This
happened almost every time a lecturer asked the class a question. For some
reason, I was always overcome with tension and had to think before answering,
even if I was totally sure of the answer, and the fact that some of my course mates,
especially one particular annoying one we all know, were already muttering ( in
that one's case, shouting) answers, didn't help. How could this be? I read
hours every night, but somehow almost always managed to forget before the next
day. But still, DVM II students are fond of saying things like the questions
are tough and all, but we should not depend on what we know. How then, please,
are we supposed to pass? On what we do not know? Some lecturers even state
blatantly that they don't want “oversabi” when answering their questions, and the
DVM II would advise us to write it all, the page must be full, even draw, and a
lecturer once said if he saw a diagram where he didn't request it, you've
automatically failed. Please, I'm confused.
During the break period
(which didn't come fast enough- thank God the break was even free) I started to
go out to get food for myself—I honestly could not remember the last time I had
a balanced diet—when Anita stopped me. "Ayo, how come you didn't know
intercellular junctions?" she asked. I immediately launched into a summary
of my woes, how I kept forgetting what I read, how the time never seemed to be
enough, the fact that I didn't know how the rest of my course mates seemed to
be comfortable with everything and I was the only one lagging behind, and all
that. After my sermon, she only had six words for me, six words which were not
helpful, by the way: "Don't worry.
Shebi na you na."
See ehn, there are some kind
of friends, they might even be your roommates, they'll stay awake reading while
you sleep off every night, they might even sing you a lullaby sef, and during
the exam period, if you say you've not read anything and they actually KNOW
you've not read anything, they'll still tell you you're their boss. These kind
of evil people... these whiners, it’s as if they don't know they're not helping
matters. What do they think whining is useful for?
Anyway, I just eyed Anita and
went to buy my things. On my way back I met Tolani, my friend in DVM V. We
greeted each other, and after that, she asked me how I was holding up. I could
not but pour out my lament once more. She only smiled and said that it was going
to get better, and when I leave DVM I, there was still much worse ahead. Eh?
Come to think of it, this theory of 'there is greater sorrow uphill' have been
following me ever since I could remember. When is that worst thing coming down,
please, if it’s not now? Looking at the DVM V students sef, I think they all
ought to have been awarded for coming this far and not giving up. How they got
up there is like magic to me.
It was soon time for my
biochemistry class. Thank God, at least I was up to date on the note, or so I thought,
before I Dr Soetan started throwing out questions and Tomiwa, the annoying
person I was referring to who sits in front and doesn't wait for lecturers to
finish their frame of thoughts before answering, almost trampled over the
projector in her haste to fly up and answer the question they won't pay her
money for. For a moment I even thought NASU had suddenly appeared with canes at
the door to chase us out—oh, yeah, by the way, we are on a STRIKE—and some of
my course mates also, since one was hurriedly packing his books into his bag.
Shoo? High blood pressure is coming. I
couldn't even process the question before she answered and spoilt my chance, or
hear any other sef, because she kept answering before the lecturer finished
talking, to the extent that the lecturer actually told her that she wasn't the
only one in the class. Abi o. Left to me she would have been sent out sef. Anyway,
the class ended by 4pm, and I added 54 more slides to my already encyclopedic
collection.
After that, I had to go for
my GES, which was getting more confusing with each class. Who knew 'rub' was
meant to be pronounced 'rab' and 'example' was actually 'igzample'? I just hope
I won't bang this one. After the class our tutor proudly announced we were
having a test the following week. In my tired state I couldn't summon the
energy to shout against that with the rest of the class. Test?! When I was
setting my reading time table I forgot that I was studying GES and didn't add
it. When I discovered the mistake I didn't even bother to correct it, resolving
to just do TDB for it a day to the test. Now, on the same day with our gross
anatomy test, another test has come up. “Kuku kill me now.”
By 6:15 pm, I was out and on
my way to my squatter lodge. After eating, I weighed my options, as any other
day. Sleep, and risk not waking up till the next morning, or read, and risk
dozing off? After a while, I decided to read my physiology note- where we had
to learn red blood cell count, types of Hb, life span of red blood cells, etc.
for not less than seven species of animals, including human beings themselves.
Imagine! And Medicine students will still be feeling like they're doing
something, and we're the ones that came to school to play ball. Nonsense!
I managed to keep my eyes
open with the aid of music, brushing my teeth, eating, coffee, etc. till about
1am. By 4:30 when I woke up, I found out that I'd fallen asleep again at my
table. I quickly transferred to my bed. Life was too short to be deceiving
myself that I could do TDB that night.
Dedicated to all struggling DVM1 students.
The sun will come out tomorrow.
Note: Names and sexes of characters have
been changed to protect identity.
Written by Jinerva
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