Who would write this?
- I miss my home, my baroque princess bed, Romeo my iguana and, of course, my family.
- Tiffany’s has yet to open a branch in Co. Meath but Mum was kind enough to treat me to a full Irish in a posh café.
- Medicine seems like the trajectory for me, but if I don’t like it after a year, I can take my maximum points elsewhere.
- I found them on eBay; a divine pair of Christian Louboutim. At $900 (€575) they were practically giving them away.
- If you’re going to wear an Aran sweater, you’d better make sure the jeans scream ironic island chic. And the shoes need to be in agreement.
- … over muffins and builder’s blend (or mung beans and soy latte - I’m sure the Tesco brigade are as worried about the bikini season as I am), the good grocers …
- But they asked me about shopping on the Champs Élysées - and that’s where I spent mid-term! I simply had to tell all.
- Phew. Today is the turn of French, a pleasant and civilised aspect of the Leaving Cert that always puts me in a good mood. I’m having a croissant and a bowl of coffee for breakfast and wearing Yves St Laurent for good measure.
You’re thinking rich kid, right? Diamonds on the soles of her shoes type, yes? A straight backed, nose in the air sort. Or as we say around here, a stick stuck up the arse / thinks her shite doesn’t smell sort. If it weren’t for the Co. Meath reference you’d probably have assumed D4.
The last point is a give away - a stick stuck up the arse / thinks her shite doesn’t smell sort who was sitting the school-leaving exams.
This, ladies and gentlemen of the bloggery, was written by Ms. Laura Brady of Enfield, Co. Meath in the Exam Diary column of the Irish Times. (No link to the Times because of their damn paywall, but you can read Ms. Brady republished in full for free on skoool.ie)
I began reading her column on Tuesday last week which was then about halfway though. I was also about halfway though making my dinner and her mention of buying a €575 pair of shoes had my blood boiling hotter than my spuds. A student, a school goer, a non-earner being able to pay €287.50 each for shoes. And she figured they were practically giving them away.
Gobshite that I am, I followed her column from then on and my blood continued to boil. Big things like they way she looked down on the Tesco staff. Small, niggling things like saying she landed the last “punc” in her Irish exam. Ponc, ponc, ponc! Damn it, p-O-n-c! Unless of course she had somehow managed to fit in a quick shag with Sid Vicious between answers.
I asked myself what kind of little world does she live in. Did she not realise that the world she portrayed was alien to all bar a tiny few other Leaving Cert students? That other students could not identify with her? Did the Irish Times realise this? Did the Times not realise they were alienating future readers? Was it too late to drop the column? Could they? Was she selected as a favour to someone on the staff? So many questions. So much boiled blood I was leaving Clonakilty in the ha’penny place.
Only on finding the skoool.ie website did I begin to calm down. I went back through the column to the start and learned more of her.
Third time to sit the Leaving. Second time around she repeated both 5th and 6th years in a boarding school. This time in a points-farm on Leeson Street. Repeating not because of failing but because she needs much better grades to get into medicine.
I began to pity her. Pity her innocence. Her ignorance. What her cocooned upbringing had done to her. Her misplaced self-confidence. She will never hack med-school. It’s tough. Damn tough. Getting in is hard, but with four years studying for the same exam in the best schools of course you’ll get the required grades. Staying in is harder and taking twenty odd years to complete a 6-7 years course will not be an option.
Even if she does get through what a pitiful bedside manner she will have with her attitude to those of us who never mid-termed on the Champs Élysées, shop at Brown Thomas, wear Yves St Laurent?
I am still angry at her: Medicine seems like the trajectory for me, but if I don’t like it after a year, I can take my maximum points elsewhere. Go on then. Take up a place that someone else would die for! Waste it.
I am still angry, but I pity her more. This is all a game to her. It’s not real. Life is not real. She can play with a course in medicine. If she tires of it or finds she can’t win she can find a new toy. Her parents’ money will buy it.
Update (14/08/2008): More of this twaddle. The IT have her back again. And worse - they will have her writing about her college experiences in the autumn.
Update:
BlogoSquare
34 Comments so far (Add 1 more)