“Yes you, you also stand up and leave the class!” Ma’am Imrana pointed towards me with a pencil which at that instant seemed to be an unsheathed shimmering dagger ready to attack.

“O God! Not a-g-a-i-n!” I sighed to myself as my hands impulsively brought the register (the only object that I prefer bringing to the university) to my face. I felt abashed to the very core of my heart. And then came the very least unexpected smile on my face and I began to grin. But why she told me to leave the class; I just gave a hearty laugh when she was expelling Shoaib from the theatre. I was ‘comparatively’ innocent and a milder culprit!

Now when I look back and begin to examine the sole cause of that ridiculous smile that cleaved my face, I can sort out only one reason for that. It is: it was not the first time I was being asked to leave the class; I was beginning to get used to it!

Physiology lectures at KEMU are a great terror. You never know at what particular instant you’ll hear a damning, nerve-cracking and heart-dooming voice that tells you to leave the class. In my First Year, it was Sir Shafique who told me to leave the class when I could not answer his query. But thanks to God; he was at least ‘a little more polite’ when he ‘kicked’ me out!

These days, whenever Sir Javed enters the lecture theater, my heart races to 300 beats/minute in a matter of moments, every inch of my body starts secreting adrenaline and I start reciting some ‘durood’ so as to evade his eyes. And when I am caught red-handed for not being prepared for the lecture, I just want somehow that I collapse and the Rescue team come and take me away.

No matter how many certificates or prizes or quiz competitions you win, no matter how many societies you head, and no matter under what adverse circumstances you paved your way into KE, you’ll always remain for your teachers another ‘cretin’ among the other 286 cretins that the lecture theater coops!

King Edward houses the wisest and the sharpest students of our province. So, it’s natural that we can’t restrict ourselves to studies. To feed our souls, for our gratification, we participate in sports, the events organized by various societies and some other not-to-be-mentioned-here stuff. We are not the ‘Boom Boom Afridi-type’ to claim all- roundedness in curricular as well as extra-curricular activities.

If you tell me to write a report on the Boys Hostel, I shall write:

• Cricket in the corridors
• A horror movie every night
• English and Punjabi songs played on woofers
• Frequent outings
• Red Chilli home delivery
• Chaman ice-cream and cold coffee, depending on when and how you pass a substage or a tutorial

…and the story goes on.

For all these ‘meals’ for our souls, for all these never-to-be-forgotten laughters, and for all these outings, we have to repay in the Physiology Department when we hear a polite, “Daac Saab! Get out; you are not wanted here!”