In the Niger River region, there is a town whose name is the stuff of dreams: the mysterious Timbuktu. They say that, a very long time ago, the nomads entrusted the care of a well there to an old ... [+]
8.21pm:
Roughly three and a half hours till midnight. My fingers hurt from all the typing and the use of the trackpad on my laptop this past week. But above all else, my eyes hurt the most. I would love to claim that I spent the whole day diligently working on my essay submission but I didn't. My classes today ended at noon and I rushed all the way back home. I had a quick meal, pulled the curtains down in my room and locked myself in. The essay submission was going to be due at 23:59 tonight. One more final day and I do not have to touch this essay forever. But as soon as I settled into my seat at my desk all the exhaustion from this week just flooded my entire being. It was the end of the semester and assignments had been piling up like landfill. I had no room to breathe. It was one assignment after another for every single class. A presentation on Monday. A test on Tuesday. Something on Thursday. And now, a final end-of-term essay. I had to first work on the assignments that were due first. I knew tonight was going to be all or nothing.
8.33pm:
In all fairness, I did start early. However, I changed my essay question until I finally gave in and settled on the easiest one in the list of questions. I knew that I could easily write an essay on this question in a week. The past two questions were simply too complex to talk about in a 3,000-word essay. But the problem is right now I am just so tired. This afternoon at my desk when I was about to write I effortlessly moved my cursor to the internet icon and before I knew it I lost myself watching YouTube. I felt that one video could relax me. Just one. Especially after coming back from school and having had such a grueling week I felt that I deserved it. But one video became another and then another and I ended up binge-watching for two hours straight. I quickly closed the browser and opened my Word document.
9pm:
Three hours to the deadline. How did I end up here? I wrote a bit in the afternoon, went back to YouTube, had dinner, opened up my Word document, went back to YouTube and now I am here. I can't process a single word anymore. My eyes are hurting. I can only see dashes of black and empty spaces of white. I scroll through the readings for relevant quotes that I left out in my table of quotations but my eyes are too tired to catch anything. What was that reading in class? Let me boot it up. Why did the teaching assistant not align the book when photocopying it? The photocopied words are slowly being swallowed by the spine of the book. Not helping my eyes. Why did I have to watch YouTube when eating dinner? Why didn't I give my eyes a rest? And throughout the whole week I was staring at my screen day and night, rushing submissions for my other classes. The phone does not even help when I look at it during break time. Come on, come on. Just focus. One word at a time. Okay, I found something. Quickly, Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V. What's the author's name again? What page is this?
9.40pm:
I am rubbing my eyes now. They hurt so much. They hurt more than my wrists and my fingers. If only I had picked the easier question at the start. Why did I even try to attempt the question the professor wished more of us in class would attempt? Who did I think I was? Why did I even attempt it in the first place? Who cares about impressing the professor? Maybe, deep down inside, I wanted to. In class, I am silent but my head is usually swarming with thoughts on the question. I look to my left and right in class and all I see are bots—literally. On my classmates' laptop screens are ChatGPT browsers. Is that why I chose that question initially? An inferiority complex? A need to prove myself? My professor will think I am some stupid, foolish, unambitious student. I can already see the look in her eye in class during moments of silence.
9.50pm:
Why all these assignments? It is as though they are squeezing us and churning our brains into butter! My eyes are hurting but it seems that the pain has become a quiet part of reality now. I type and scroll. I answer the 5W1H, minus the two Ws in my head as I keep typing. Why? What? How? Why did I write that sentence down? Why did I cite that author? What does it mean? So what? How does it link? Yes. At this crucial moment, I finally found out how to write an essay! I finally understood what "They Say, I Say" means. I just cite people and write what I think about them. But it's 9.50 pm! Why only now did I realize how to write an essay? And this is my fourth year. I would have gotten a higher GPA if I had figured this out years ago. Why now?
10.13pm:
I type silently on my keyboard. To rest my eyes, I just focus on looking at my keyboard as I type. I have not looked up at my screen for a good 20 minutes now. I only see the words that I want to type in my mind's eye and hope that they appear on the screen correctly. I look up. So many red lines. It's 10.15pm. I am still stuck on my last paragraph. I am almost done. I click open my new table and look for my notes on readings. I need to type. I yearn for deliverance. It's almost done. Is this what they mean when they say that character is forged under fire? Gold is purified under fire. Is this essay gold? I think I am being too presumptuous. I swear, had it been possible to figure out how to write an essay two years ago, I would have written it. But now, it's extremely painful. I am certain that this is the worst essay ever. My professor would hate me. Okay, I've got to stop writing and move on to my citations. Argh! My last paragraph is still incomplete. My last paragraph. My eyes can't absorb anything anymore. I have not even started on my citations. ChatGPT. Please. Help. Me. I'm not cheating. It's just formatting!
10.30pm:
Oh no, where did this quotation come from? I scroll and scroll. There are just too many placeholders that I've put as citations. I plunge into this task, manually focusing on one citation at a time. ChatGPT, you've got to help me format this out for me please. But there is not enough time. Copy and paste. I scroll up and down. Who wrote this quote again?
11.41pm:
I think my citations are all in order. Okay. I need a conclusion I think. No, before that, my last paragraph. What? I did not hit the word limit. I can still write this. I can still write this. No. Crap. Forget it. Wait, why is this placeholder still here? Who wrote this again? Ah, never mind, I shall delete this. I can't cite this anymore.
11.42pm:
Conclusion?! Okay, I am just going to rephrase my introduction. I can't help it. I am running out of time. Proofread? I can't read anymore. Nothing is going into my mind. My eyes—when I look away from the screen and out the window everything is a blur. My eye sockets are unplugged.
I will not submit a late submission! No. My essay is already in shambles. A late submission will by default just pull my grade down and I am already closer to a failing grade. Those are not good for my chances. But my last paragraph, just a few more sentences, come on. Come on. Hit that word count. Anything. Anything that comes to mind! Oh wait, I know what to say now: the stasis of consumption operates as a figurative apparatus for the absolution of the quotidian anxiety surrounding ontological totality....
11.57pm:
Okay, that's it. That's it... I got to upload it now!
11.58pm:
I open my browser. Come on, hurry up!
11.59pm:
Upload! Uploading!? Loading icon still spinning!? Hands on the clock ticking. Which is faster? I simply don't know...
Roughly three and a half hours till midnight. My fingers hurt from all the typing and the use of the trackpad on my laptop this past week. But above all else, my eyes hurt the most. I would love to claim that I spent the whole day diligently working on my essay submission but I didn't. My classes today ended at noon and I rushed all the way back home. I had a quick meal, pulled the curtains down in my room and locked myself in. The essay submission was going to be due at 23:59 tonight. One more final day and I do not have to touch this essay forever. But as soon as I settled into my seat at my desk all the exhaustion from this week just flooded my entire being. It was the end of the semester and assignments had been piling up like landfill. I had no room to breathe. It was one assignment after another for every single class. A presentation on Monday. A test on Tuesday. Something on Thursday. And now, a final end-of-term essay. I had to first work on the assignments that were due first. I knew tonight was going to be all or nothing.
8.33pm:
In all fairness, I did start early. However, I changed my essay question until I finally gave in and settled on the easiest one in the list of questions. I knew that I could easily write an essay on this question in a week. The past two questions were simply too complex to talk about in a 3,000-word essay. But the problem is right now I am just so tired. This afternoon at my desk when I was about to write I effortlessly moved my cursor to the internet icon and before I knew it I lost myself watching YouTube. I felt that one video could relax me. Just one. Especially after coming back from school and having had such a grueling week I felt that I deserved it. But one video became another and then another and I ended up binge-watching for two hours straight. I quickly closed the browser and opened my Word document.
9pm:
Three hours to the deadline. How did I end up here? I wrote a bit in the afternoon, went back to YouTube, had dinner, opened up my Word document, went back to YouTube and now I am here. I can't process a single word anymore. My eyes are hurting. I can only see dashes of black and empty spaces of white. I scroll through the readings for relevant quotes that I left out in my table of quotations but my eyes are too tired to catch anything. What was that reading in class? Let me boot it up. Why did the teaching assistant not align the book when photocopying it? The photocopied words are slowly being swallowed by the spine of the book. Not helping my eyes. Why did I have to watch YouTube when eating dinner? Why didn't I give my eyes a rest? And throughout the whole week I was staring at my screen day and night, rushing submissions for my other classes. The phone does not even help when I look at it during break time. Come on, come on. Just focus. One word at a time. Okay, I found something. Quickly, Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V. What's the author's name again? What page is this?
9.40pm:
I am rubbing my eyes now. They hurt so much. They hurt more than my wrists and my fingers. If only I had picked the easier question at the start. Why did I even try to attempt the question the professor wished more of us in class would attempt? Who did I think I was? Why did I even attempt it in the first place? Who cares about impressing the professor? Maybe, deep down inside, I wanted to. In class, I am silent but my head is usually swarming with thoughts on the question. I look to my left and right in class and all I see are bots—literally. On my classmates' laptop screens are ChatGPT browsers. Is that why I chose that question initially? An inferiority complex? A need to prove myself? My professor will think I am some stupid, foolish, unambitious student. I can already see the look in her eye in class during moments of silence.
9.50pm:
Why all these assignments? It is as though they are squeezing us and churning our brains into butter! My eyes are hurting but it seems that the pain has become a quiet part of reality now. I type and scroll. I answer the 5W1H, minus the two Ws in my head as I keep typing. Why? What? How? Why did I write that sentence down? Why did I cite that author? What does it mean? So what? How does it link? Yes. At this crucial moment, I finally found out how to write an essay! I finally understood what "They Say, I Say" means. I just cite people and write what I think about them. But it's 9.50 pm! Why only now did I realize how to write an essay? And this is my fourth year. I would have gotten a higher GPA if I had figured this out years ago. Why now?
10.13pm:
I type silently on my keyboard. To rest my eyes, I just focus on looking at my keyboard as I type. I have not looked up at my screen for a good 20 minutes now. I only see the words that I want to type in my mind's eye and hope that they appear on the screen correctly. I look up. So many red lines. It's 10.15pm. I am still stuck on my last paragraph. I am almost done. I click open my new table and look for my notes on readings. I need to type. I yearn for deliverance. It's almost done. Is this what they mean when they say that character is forged under fire? Gold is purified under fire. Is this essay gold? I think I am being too presumptuous. I swear, had it been possible to figure out how to write an essay two years ago, I would have written it. But now, it's extremely painful. I am certain that this is the worst essay ever. My professor would hate me. Okay, I've got to stop writing and move on to my citations. Argh! My last paragraph is still incomplete. My last paragraph. My eyes can't absorb anything anymore. I have not even started on my citations. ChatGPT. Please. Help. Me. I'm not cheating. It's just formatting!
10.30pm:
Oh no, where did this quotation come from? I scroll and scroll. There are just too many placeholders that I've put as citations. I plunge into this task, manually focusing on one citation at a time. ChatGPT, you've got to help me format this out for me please. But there is not enough time. Copy and paste. I scroll up and down. Who wrote this quote again?
11.41pm:
I think my citations are all in order. Okay. I need a conclusion I think. No, before that, my last paragraph. What? I did not hit the word limit. I can still write this. I can still write this. No. Crap. Forget it. Wait, why is this placeholder still here? Who wrote this again? Ah, never mind, I shall delete this. I can't cite this anymore.
11.42pm:
Conclusion?! Okay, I am just going to rephrase my introduction. I can't help it. I am running out of time. Proofread? I can't read anymore. Nothing is going into my mind. My eyes—when I look away from the screen and out the window everything is a blur. My eye sockets are unplugged.
I will not submit a late submission! No. My essay is already in shambles. A late submission will by default just pull my grade down and I am already closer to a failing grade. Those are not good for my chances. But my last paragraph, just a few more sentences, come on. Come on. Hit that word count. Anything. Anything that comes to mind! Oh wait, I know what to say now: the stasis of consumption operates as a figurative apparatus for the absolution of the quotidian anxiety surrounding ontological totality....
11.57pm:
Okay, that's it. That's it... I got to upload it now!
11.58pm:
I open my browser. Come on, hurry up!
11.59pm:
Upload! Uploading!? Loading icon still spinning!? Hands on the clock ticking. Which is faster? I simply don't know...
