A day in the life of...

She wanted to sleep forever, but her mom was a pretty consistent waker. “C’mon Seema, get up, you’ll get late”, she yelled. “Yeah mom, just… just 5 more minutes”. But how could those 5 minutes be fruitful if her mom switched on the radio full blast right next to her ear!

Wincing and cursing Seema got up to face her day.
Soon enough, another tussle for breakfast ensued, “No badams ma. Please.”. However, ma’s look was enough to quell any further protests.

She had to make sure she left her house by 7.50, otherwise she’d get late. And most of her monstrous professors had a habit of not letting late comers in. Running to catch the bus to the train station, Seema looked groggily at the world.
Thought bubble: “Why do I always have to wait for at least 10 minutes before my bus shows up, when everyone else seems to have buses just waiting for them?”
And the traffic… Seema’s worst nightmare! A 10 minute ride always stretched to 20 or more, how she hated every car around her!

The train ride was mostly blissful though. A peaceful 30 minutes wherein she would often listen to her music, catch up on reading, talk to friends or just think. This really was the best part of the day. And the perfect rhythm of a moving train, exactly what she needed to contemplate. And if it were raining, ah, then things would be just about perfect!

Seema reached college, thankfully, with 10 minutes to spare. Her first class is always at 9 in the morning. (Her biggest woe. Being a lover of sleep, getting up early was probably the most heinous crime possible)
Anyway, classes began as they usually do and Seema was busy preparing for her day, the real one, the one that would begin after classes got over. As she sat and counted, she realized that she had to complete around 5 projects and prepare presentations for them, deadlines approaching. *Sigh*
“There is just too much work”, she thought to herself. But she reasoned that she knew this was going to happen, this is what they’d all told her would happen.
A test was announced and Seema panicked. She’d have to go to the library and issue a book before all of them were gone.

Her phone began vibrating. Thanking her lucky stars that she’d remembered to put it on silent mode, she looked at her screen – a message. It was from the society she was working for. Seema remembered that she’d been so proud of herself when she’d gotten though their interview, but now she dreaded that message. It could only mean more work. It read,’ Alumni Cell meeting at 6.00 pm in room no. 8, AJ College’ *Sigh*. There go all dreams of leaving for home early.
The class got over, and they had a 15 minute break. Seema rushed to the Alumni Cell room and got out the list of the institute’s Alumni she had to call. The college believed in touching bases with all its ex-students. Picking up the phone, she breathed deeply and dialed the number. After 5 such calls, it was time to rush back to class for the next lecture. Some quick mental calculation and she realized she’d have to make at least 15 more such trips if she didn’t sit down and do major chunks of the work in one go.

The phone began vibrating again; it was her head editor from the Alumni Editorial Team. “Hey, wassup boss?” “Where are the articles I’d given you?” came the abrupt reply. “I’ve got them all edited, I’ve e-mailed them to you”. There were 10 of them and long and boring, Seema recalled grimacing. The editing had taken away a precious 2 hours from her! Boy!

The next class started and it was her weakest subject: Cost Accounting. Deciding that she couldn’t make head or tail of what the teacher was saying, she took her laptop out and began formatting the Alumni newsletter. The font, the colours, the placement & sequencing of articles, headings and even the margins, everything needed to be done, and soon. The deadline for submitting this was 9 today. She e-mailed a couple of her seniors, asking for photographs for the newsletter.The class was about to get over and Seema had to pay attention, the teacher was taking the attendance after all!

Next up was Quantitative Analysis, another horrid subject. Ma’am came and began spewing all she knew about Maths. Another 1.5 hours later, Seema was busy on the phone again, calling her mom up to tell her that she’d be late, calling some of her seniors for notes and also the guy in her Alumni calling group about his progress.
She went downstairs to grab a bite. She picked up one of the sandwiches because they were made the fastest and ran up again for a project meeting. As soon as she entered the room, one of her group members said,” Hey Seema, would you please write the proposal for our Eco project?” “Oh… ok, tell me exactly what you want?”
A 30 minute meeting ensued, discussions ranged from what was to be done, to who would search for what, to how was it to be presented.

After the meeting, the next class began, thankfully a good and interesting one, Information Systems. Listening intently, Seema wondered whose register she could borrow for consistent notes.

A quick dash to the admin office after the class to book a locker and Seema was back in the main building for another meeting, this time with her Marketing project group.
Someone told her the date sheet was out and the exams were to begin in a month.
Thought Bubble: “Oh dear, when am I going to get time to study?? This trimester system SUCKS”

As she thought these depressing thoughts, one of her friends approached her, “when do we work on Derivatives?” ‘Derivatives’ was the topic for a paper the two of them were writing, for a competition and the last date was rapidly approaching. Luckily, her partner had completed most of the research so it was only a matter of compilation.
After a little discussion, she went for the Paragana Marketing team meeting. The president began," Paragana is our institute's flagship event guys, and we want to make it the best possible. We will invite 20 B-schools for various events spread over 3 days and it is the marketing team’s job to ensure that everyone who matters gets to know about this."
Thought bubble: “Why did I volunteer for this? Oh yeah, for the marketing! But what marketing will I do running around the entire city for sponsors and advertising? *sigh* Why do I do these things to myself?”

Seema looked at her watch, uh-oh, it was 5.59. Time for the Alumni Society meeting. She excused herself from the meeting, drew some dirty looks and ran to AJ College. Another hour of lectures from the Society seniors about how incompetent the juniors were and more instructions and they were left to go. Her head-ed walked up to her and demanded to see the formatted newsletter. Seema spent another 20 minutes explaining everything she’d done and was not surprised when she was asked to make many changes.
Wearily Seema walked out of the campus, and hailed an auto for the station. The guy refused to go. Irritation crept up her spine.
Thought bubble: “I just studied the Consumer Protection Act for my Law project and its illegal for you to refuse me a ride, you jerk.”

Anyway, reaching the station she began looking forward to her train ride home. Ah, 30 minutes of pure bliss! Cool wind in her hair, and her favourite music blaring in her ear, Seema forgot all her pending work and just relaxed.

An hour later, at home, she had a yummy dinner.
Thought bubble: “My mommy is the best!”

She went online, checked all her mail. What once was only full of funny forwards and whacky e-mails was now stuffed with intimations, messages for meetings, more work and project info. She worked on the dratted Economics proposal, made the required changes in the Alumni newsletter, Google-d some more information and read up articles for a couple of her presentations. When she was finally done, she collapsed on her bed at around 12.30.
With a smile on her face.

No complaints from her… yet. This was after all just an ordinary day in the life of Seema.