If you have that one laptop that has been with you through thick and thin for many years put up your hand. Thanks. Put it down. I was not going to write about my laptop journey but then I turned on this thing only for it to shut down after ten seconds. Reason? Battery. It is now a desktop. I can only use it when it’s connected to power. Another handy trick that makes it last for a few minutes is charging removing the battery while it is connected and then putting it back. It’s annoying. I am not about to get a new battery. Why? This is the second battery to have served this laptop. The first died the same way.
Tag: Campus
I have written this for the longest time possible. In my mind. I didn’t know I was doing it. The pieces just came together. Slowly. One day at a time. Bringing together memories and thoughts from the past and from the present. Building up dreams of the future too. My brain has been full of activity. This story and that story. This thought and that thought. This memory and that memory. Fragments here and there. Piecing up together. Joining each other like Lego. Coming to birth.
Yesterday was my last day. My last day at the Office Park. My laptop had already closed for the holidays by early morning, freezing every one minute. And I am not exaggerating. I wrote the first part of this piece on my notebook.
I am so tired, but somehow I had to do this. October was just a few minutes past and I promised myself I would share lessons I have learnt from the month with you. It has been one interesting month.
The most traumatic transition I have gone through in the recent past is moving from campus life to working. That is folly to a normal adult who is used to working to earn a living but it is the truth. I landed a job this past holiday which was quite a task. I was supposed to work from eight to six with no real break in between. Half the time was spent on my feet attending to all kinds of people. The first day on the job I was so beat, I could not stand up for about an hour once I got home.
Announce your arrival, way before the day, to ensure you get to a place to spend the night in Main Campus. Otherwise you will end up walking to the venue and perhaps not even make it to the ceremony.
Bring your own camera, despite everyone else bringing theirs and tagging you incessantly on Facebook. You have to record these memories.
“Hi Shiku!”
“Hi there.”
“How’s school?”
“School? What school?”
Okay, people. It has come to my attention that some of you think I am still in school (going by the messages I am receiving on phone and Facebook). Well, here is the news. I am no longer a student. I cleared from Moi University on Tuesday the 9th of July 2013.
- Is on his last semester of his 8-4-4 and age is catching up. Either that or he has thrown caution to the wind. He has no idea what courses he’s taking. If he has, he has no knowledge of their titles, leave alone their codes. He never missed classes in earlier years but today, attending lectures is the exception, not the rule.
- Will remember that registration forms are filled on the day before exams, she will then scribble on some course registration form very fast, forge the signatures then fill in an examination course form. It will then hit her that she has not paid her fee yet. She’ll rush to that tiny National Bank and stand in an endless line. Back in the day, she paid her fee a month before the opening date, a good faithful freshman.
I live in a room that offers a vantage point to Hostel K and L entrances. When I say Hostel K and L, I am referring to the ladies’ hostels, make no mistake. All the same, I will tell you about the men who frequent both hostels. That common joke about the number of men who’d emerge from either hostel in the event of a fire is very true. I will describe them to you, one by one. I will do this using Hostel L since what I see there is replicated in K. (You may think I have a lot of free time; I will let you be the judge of that.)
When you have spent four years in an institution of higher learning, you learn a lot from simple observation. I have seen and heard enough to authoritatively categorize campus couples into five types.
I am seated in my room, in the dark listening to Group 1 Crew’s “Going Down” on repeat. […]
It’s 6.30 pm. It’s raining. It’s dark. I am cold. I am also feeling particularly inspired to write. […]
So you won’t marry a campus chiq, huh? But did you pause to think, even for a moment, that maybe I do not want to be married to a campus dude? You are not the only one with a choice to make, you know?
The other day there was outrage from my fellow campus ladies who could not understand why a man would not want to marry them. I have good news for you sisters; there are plenty more fish in the sea and that sea is much bigger than Moi University. No one should make you think you do not have a choice.
Finally, I began my fourth year of study last Thursday. While that is just theoretical in many ways at the moment, I have the key to my room, a mattress the size of a blanket and a positive attitude to match. The timetable may very well take a week to materialize and classes another week to take off.
(Too bad I abandoned my diary for this place. Here goes…)
I am trying really hard to love a place, to go about my day without complaining but a myriad of things get in the way.
I wake up, the doors are all locked except the main one, for a week now.