Burning the midnight oil to scaring daylights out

Some days ago, I received a photograph of our first-year tutorial group in the medical college on the college Whatsapp group. That initiated a series of exchanges of anecdotes of college life. Forty years after passing out, everyone had something to share about our years together and the life after. This made me recall an amusing incident.

Medical studies are tough. Joining a medical college after 10+2 is a totally different ball game. Back-to-back lectures, practicals, dissection hall and labs, all make a heady mixture. The course is vast and subjects varied. There are tutorials, group discussions, assignments and weekly and monthly assessments with batch-mates from different parts of the country.

And if you are a hosteller, as most students are, you find it strange how people survive on mess food. As you settle down after the initial excitement of taking the first step towards becoming an exalted doctor, it dawns upon you that life is not easy.

But then the newfound freedom overtakes everything else. No restrictions for staying out late or eating junk food or motorbike rides. You are your own boss. You do what you want and for a while you feel you are on top of the world. This goes on for a few months till you look at the exam calendar.

I fondly remember my days in the medical college. The first semester exams sent us scurrying to our seniors, asking for tips, notes and tricks to face the viva voce where you can be questioned on anything vaguely connected to your textbooks in one-on-one interactions where you can be ridiculed or made to question your decision to opt for medicine as a career.

The seniors scared us with data that so many students were unable to clear exams the previous year, and that could happen repeatedly to some. But then they shared their notes and prepared you for the “encounters”.

Over a period of time, you learn the ropes and gather a group of friends with whom you have nocturnal study sessions. There are some who you consider your rivals or competitors. I remember after a few hours of studying, I would go for a stroll in hostel corridors to stretch my legs. I would look at windows of my batch-mates to see whose light was still on, imagining who all were studying. Trying to outdo them, I would keep studying till most of the lights got switched off.

In the final year, a studious fellow shifted to our block. His room always had the lights on even after my latenight sorties. That would egg me on further till I would finally call it a day out of exhaustion. This went on till the last exam.

Soon, the results were declared and I had beaten that batch-mate by quite a distance. While celebrating our passing out, I picked up courage to ask him what pulled him down despite burning the midnight oil endlessly. He looked surprised and said since joining the medical college he had always slept with the room lights on because he was afraid of darkness!

FOR A WHILE, YOU FEEL YOU ARE ON TOP OF THE WORLD. THIS GOES ON FOR A FEW MONTHS TILL YOU LOOK AT THE EXAM CALENDAR