Exams, exams and more exams

I screwed up my paper today. Abnormal Psychology. Which is my best paper, by the way, I'm embarrassingly good at Psychology. And I screwed it up. Halfway through the three hours I felt sick-er than I was feeling in the morning (and yesterday, and the day before)...and so I had to run out of the exam hall, navigate my way across half the bloody block to find a loo.

The exam itself...well. My batch mates and I spent more than just considerable amount of time studying these annoying disorders that are fun to know about, but a pain in all the wrong places if you have to study them and remember everything word-for-word as mentioned in the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders). If you ask me, the abbreviation should be DSMMD...but hey...whatever works for lazy people who cant include two more alphabets. Anyway, so we spent way too much time studying the 7 anxiety disorders (specific phobia, social phobia, panic disorder, panic disorder with and without agoraphobia, and generalized anxiety disorder), 4 somatoform disorders and 4 dissociative disorders...and the ONLY question that was asked was SYMPTOMS OF F***ING CONVERSION DISORDER. Not even OCD!!! (Obsessive-compulsive disorder, which everyone around me is convinced I suffer from. My point is, I don't suffer from it. I actually quite enjoy it)

So we all had a screwing exam, and my misery was/is compounded by this viral fever/flu I'm down with. It just refuses to go away, the damned thing! My medicines have this nice sedative effect, which is exactly what you need during exams, because that's the time you should be sleepily gazing at pages and pages of notes, not even recognizing the language they're written in.

You need the morning dose of the medicines, just before you go in to write your paper, because the paper itself is so interesting, it's a struggle to not fall asleep. (Note: use of sarcasm)

We have this (ahem) interesting system in our college-turned-university. The question bank system. Which means all the lecturers from each department feed in a set of questions to the computer, and the computer picks out questions from all for the exam. Which means you invariably have the SAME question coming for 2 marks and 10 marks. Genius. Pure genius.

A friend asked me today "what've you been upto?" And I was a little stumped. Did she mean besides the numerous time-consuming pointless assignments and projects that are, at the end of everything, worth just 10 or 20 measly marks? Or did she mean besides the an-exam-every-month syndrome? So I have been upto actively Not Having A Life. Which is fun, because when you're 20 and in college, you should be cooped up night after night in poorly lit cramped spaces doing projects, research, and assignments like "girly scrapbooks" (for a paper in law, mind). That is exactly what life is about.

Ah, you're wondering about the girly scrapbook. See, in our class of 80, we have about 9 boys. (Lucky them, I say, being surrounded by bitchy, whiny women) So our lecturer in this pointless paper called Media Laws and Ethics decides that since we're not over-worked enough with a news bulletin, a movie, and about 23-odd assignments (all due at the same time, give or take a day), she wants us to make a "girly, glitzy scrapbook". What's the problem, you ask? Well, the scarpbook has to have at least 6 different articles holding different views on ONE SINGLE CASE in India, and has to be followed over a period of at least 3 months in papers, and should be connected to one of the few barely-known media laws. Which was so simple for us, because there were only about 3 cases like that, and there were 80 of us, and all 80 of us needed to have a "different" viewpoint. Oh and this was an individual project.

We don't do girly! Miyu and I had a hard time thinking girly, glittery ways of putting together newspaper articles going on and on about some random nonsense that we doubt they themselves understood. Ok, well, not Miyu. Her scrapbook made me turn away from her in shame...handmade paper, glitter...the works. Shameful. I cut out chart paper to size A4 and stuck my newspaper articles on those. No glitter for me, thanks.

And then there was the external examiner. "He's so cute!" gushed one of the BCFs. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this term, it is the Bimbo Clone Factory syndrome. It's all those girls who shop at the same places, wear the same style of clothes, have the same shoes, the same handbags, etc etc. You get the drift. This city is full of them. They are also known in some circles as Barbie Dolls. Anyway, so once someone said "so cute" I knew I'd hate him. And I did. He made no sense, spoke with a lisping whisper (or a whispering lisp) that he probably thought made him look smart or scholarly or something. (I heard him speak normally afterward...don't slam me for being insensitive) He asked me the same question 7 times in different ways, and we ended up arguing about sociology. Excerpts -

WeirdMan -
"If the UK government has no problem with this, why would the Indian government have a problem?"
Me -
o.O "Er...MAYBE because the Indian society still needs to evolve to accept what other nations consider alright...we're still very traditional in a lot of ways."
WeirdMan -
*gives me a long, regarding look* "So you're saying India is backward. Are you ashamed of being an Indian?"
Me -
o.O "Um, no. I said India is still very traditional, which doesn't mean we're backward. We have a lot of societal, cultural and religious constraints that will take years to evolve into something more open. That doesn't signify backwardness, it signifies strong roots. And I'm not ashamed of being Indian."
WeirdMan -
"Yes, OK, but if the UK government does not censor a particular movie then why should the Indian government censor it?"

And so on. It was exasperating. Tiring. Annoying. He dismissed me at the end of it with a smirk and a wave of the hand. Which is when I wanted to clout him over the head with a frying pan. Luckily for him I wasn't carrying one around.

So, yes, I have been Actively Not Having A Life. Of course, there have been sources of amusement throughout all the madness, but those don't count towards Having A Life.

Ergoplum, following another unexplained mood swing, didn't turn up for the exam today. I understand, I do...I have my mood swings too...bad ones...but I try hard not to be anti-social and I write my exams... I called him about a zillion times today (no, I didn't count, it's an exaggeration) and when he finally picked up I couldn't yell at him. Hormones, hormones. I just did the whole "I-love-you-and-all-but-you-can't-keep-doing-this" psychobabble. He let me speak, he did. I think he figured, after the 3rd time I told him how much I loved him, that I was high on cough syrup. He did make a small joke though. Good for him. *insert smile here*

Well...the next paper is in Industrial Psychology, which is by far the most boring paper ever. Everything resembles everything else and nothing is unique. Which makes writing the paper a real *itch. My only consolation is that it will all be over in a few months.

Ta!