Rite of Passage

Perhaps the A lvls are a rite of passage of sorts, the final chapter in the bildungsroman of the JC experience. Hark back to the JC1 era of yore, and one can find that back then, it was but a distant cloud on the horizon, a mere wrinkle in the fabric of social revel that one builds around oneself. It is an almost surreal concept, omnipresent but barely perceived; after all, why worry about it when one has an entire year left?

The completion of Promos heralds the infinite bliss of the December holidays, a calm that pervades and creates an entire lifestyle of its own. The clock ticks around enjoyment, its hands pointing enticingly to the playgrounds of Orchard, Sentosa and various other locales. It is a friend, a companion, a benevolent chronologue of one's teenage prime, smiling merrily down from the mantelpiece or the wall. It reassures us with a twinkle of the second hand that the splendour of life is there to be explored, touched, felt, experienced. There is plenty of time for everything else.

The beginning of year two marks a sudden shift of paradigm, a terrible jolt that strikes us out of the air and on to the ground. Hark, this is the year of the A lvls! That distant monster that was barely discernable in JC1 is now suddenly a looming inevitability, destroying all straying thoughts of play and enjoyment, supplanting the vigor of youth with the cadaverous stasis of Mugging. The friendly face on the wall or the mantelpiece now becomes the harbinger of doom, contorting with malicious satisfaction as it ticks inexorably towards our final hour. It adopts the ensign of the enemy, marching us ever forward, and every glance at it brings images of the dreaded time. Calenders serve a new, terrible function: countdown.

Some of us falter in the face of this, indulging in the self-delusion that somehow, by some means, we will be prepared when the time comes. Others labor silently, constantly, content in the knowledge of their effort. Yet others, smelling danger, rage with frustration at the realisation of their academic inadequacy. What a dire contrast between now and the previous year, they cry! Tutors adopt a new, grimmer spring to their step, showing faint signs of impatience at a noisy lecture group when previously there were none. The annual mantra is conceived, and repeated: Study. Study. Mug.

Ultimately, the time comes. Studentkind withdraws within itself, and lecture notes usurp the once indisputable primacy of the television. The battle begins, to what result? It is too early to tell.

The following March, the now ex-students venture back, some bare-headed in caps, others in gaudy garments and colored hair. The tension in the hall is so thick that one can cut it with a knife! The person at the podium makes the customary speech, while her audience trembles in horrid anticipation; soon it is time, and the person picks up a piece of paper and prepares to read out the first name.