My College Life

 Is enrolling in a college really worth it? Many would argue that it is. From an academic perspective, attending university opens the door to a wealth of knowledge, resources, and opportunities that can shape a person’s career and personal growth. You gain access to professionals in your chosen field, participate in engaging discussions, and challenge your mind in ways high school never quite managed to do. Do you get a lot of benefits by entering university? Absolutely. There are scholarships, networking events, internships, career fairs, and even access to mental health services and extracurricular activities that can help you grow as a well-rounded individual. And what about friendship—those lifelong bonds people talk about? Is it true that by joining college, you’ll get so many friends and connections? Well, that depends on the person. For some, socializing is as natural as breathing. For others, it takes effort and time. Still, college can be a place where people from all walks of life cross paths. You might meet your future business partner, your closest confidant, or someone who changes your worldview entirely. So yes, it’s fair to say you can form meaningful relationships in college. As for thrilling experiences? The possibilities are endless. From late-night talks in dorm hallways, impromptu road trips, heated debates in classrooms, spontaneous club meetings, and the bittersweet stress of pulling all-nighters during finals—college can be a whirlwind of excitement. Every semester brings new challenges, new faces, and a new version of yourself taking shape. For many, it feels like a coming-of-age journey wrapped in equal parts chaos and beauty. By reading all of this, one might imagine that college is some magical place—where everything is fun, effortless, and drenched in sunlight. A paradise of youthful freedom. Rainbows and laughter at every corner. 

So, is college really fun?

“Not in  the slightest.”

Good morning, everyone! Or, well… maybe it’s afternoon? Evening? Midnight, even? Though let’s be real—who in their right mind would want to read this thing at midnight? You should be tucking yourself into bed, wrapped in a cocoon of blankets and dreams, not scrolling through this ramble. Go get some sleep, will you? Hahaha—but anyway, let’s steer this sleepy ship back on course. Hello everyone, this is Jules. Jules is a final-year student at a not-so-famous university somewhere in her city (which we won’t name because, you know, privacy is important and we’re not about to doxx our girl). Now, how does she feel about her university? Well… she loves it. Deeply. So much so that she frequently brings it up in her prayers—sometimes with gratitude, sometimes with barely concealed rage, and sometimes just to ask why her lectures always start at 7 a.m. sharp. But hey, love is complicated, isn’t it? Physically, Jules is average in height, the kind of person who blends into a crowd but would still be missed if she weren’t there. Her academic record? Also average—well, leaning a bit toward the good side on a particularly lucky semester. Personality-wise? You guessed it: average too. She doesn’t light up the room with wild charisma, nor does she fade into the wallpaper like a forgotten water bottle in a lecture hall. She exists comfortably in the middle ground—observant, calm, and incredibly skilled at reading a room before she speaks. She’s the kind of person who knows when to laugh, when to nod, and when to pretend she didn’t hear that awkward comment someone made. You might think that she kinda sounds similar to Robert, she does. Jules and Robert might just be kindred spirits in their uncanny ability to seem just normal enough to avoid unnecessary attention. Except when Jules is around the people she’s close to—then the filters drop. That’s when the weirdness creeps in. The giggles get louder, the jokes get darker, and the overthinking gets voiced out loud. It’s a rare transformation, but a delightful one. As for her social life, it’s… you guessed it again—average. Nothing wild or cinematic. No sprawling group of dozens or intense best-friend-forever duos with matching necklaces. Just a circle of three girls, including herself. Tight-knit, loyal, and a little chaotic when the mood hits. That’s her crew. That’s her home base. So here she is—Jules. Not a protagonist in a teen drama, not the mysterious transfer student, not the class clown. Just a girl at the finish line of her college years, carrying her average self with grace, humor, and just enough sass to survive another group project. Now, let’s talk about Jules’ daily life on campus, shall we?

Her day began at the ungodly hour of 5 a.m.—a time that, in her opinion, should be banned by international law. Like clockwork, her parents would barge in, voices gentle yet persistent, urging her to get up, pray, and take a bath. And like clockwork, Jules would rise… in a mood fouler than expired milk. Every single day, without fail, she emerged from the depths of her sleep cranky, hungry, and wearing the kind of scowl that could curdle fresh cream. And if you shake her body hard enough, she will slap your hands, hard. Yes, she’s a final-year university student. Yes, she still depends on her parents to wake her up. How irresponsible, right?

Wrong. Don’t be so quick to judge her.

Take a closer look. Do you see those dark smudges under her eyes? No, that’s not leftover eyeliner. Those are her battle scars—eyebags earned through relentless nights of tossing, turning, and blinking at the ceiling as the clock ticked past 2 a.m., 3 a.m., 4 a.m.… Insomnia had claimed her long ago and made itself at home in her brain like an unwanted roommate. Sleep? A luxury. Rest? A myth. Jules was a living, breathing contradiction: exhausted beyond belief yet wide awake when the stars were out. And it’s not like she didn’t try to sleep. She just... couldn’t. Because that cursed brain of hers? It only sparked to life at night. It would start humming and whirring with half-baked ideas, storylines, essay outlines, and sudden bursts of “what if” creativity the moment the world went quiet. Deadlines? She met them. Eventually. But always with puffy eyes and a coffee cup clutched like a lifeline. And every time she told herself, “Never again. I’m going to start early next time.” But every time, she found herself back in the same cycle. It was practically a habit. Then came the morning, dragging herself through the hours like a sleep-deprived zombie. From breakfast until late afternoon, her body existed on autopilot. Eyes glazed, limbs heavy, mind foggy. Professors’ voices became distant echoes. Notes blurred into doodles. Her greatest talent during these hours was perfecting the art of staying awake while looking awake.

And so, now that Jules is in her final year, you’d think things would be easier, right? Fewer classes, more free time, maybe a little breathing room? Ha. Absolutely not. That assumption couldn’t be more wrong. Big and wrong, as she’d say with a sarcastic eye-roll. In truth, this final stretch of college was the boss level of stress, and it hit harder than any midterm ever did. Gone were the days of juggling five or six classes a week—but the weight of the thesis more than made up for it. It wasn’t that she had less to do; it was that what she did have to do now loomed so much larger. More intense. More personal. And, arguably, more soul-crushing. Still, there were some constants that remained. One of them was her love for the campus library. Or, well, “love” might be too pure a word—it was more like a complicated situationship. She and her friends had grown weirdly attached to the place. Whenever they had time (or more often, whenever they were out of time), they’d pack their bags with laptops, notebooks, chargers, snacks, and march straight to the library like soldiers heading into war. Back in the fifth and sixth semesters, this routine was practically sacred. Every class seemed to demand some monstrous group project, with constantly rotating members. You couldn’t escape it—even if you wanted to. There were power struggles, ghosting teammates, too soft-hearted team leaders, and the occasional last-minute panic attack over an unshared Google Drive link. Ah, memories. Now, though, things were slightly different. Jules only had two classes a week—just two. Sounds like a dream, right? A college student’s paradise? Well, not quite. Because those empty weekdays? They weren’t filled with naps or brunches or Netflix marathons. No, they were filled with thesis work. Hours upon hours of writing, rewriting, researching, editing, formatting, citing, and panicking. So naturally, the library once again became her second home. Except this time, the enemy wasn’t a group project. It was something more intimate. More terrifying.

Her own thesis.

The thesis—the cursed, looming, soul-sucking beast. It never left her mind. Even during her so-called “breaks,” it haunted her like a persistent ghost whispering, “You should be working on your thesis.” And every time she opened the file on her laptop, her heart sank just a little more. Sometimes she stared at the screen for hours, barely typing anything, paralyzed by the sheer pressure of making everything sound academic, smart, original… good enough. She had lost count of how many times she’d melted into tears in some forgotten corner of her room or sat frozen with anxiety, her hands hovering above the keyboard while her brain screamed incoherently. But still—she showed up. With her friends beside her, often in the same sinking boat, they tried to weather it together. Swapping snacks, memes, and occasional breakdowns. A silent sisterhood of thesis sufferers, united in their struggle. Final year wasn’t any less busy. Sometimes, in the middle of staring blankly at her thesis or while sipping a too-sweet iced coffee in the library, Jules would find herself drifting into memories—soft, hazy recollections of the days when everything was just beginning. Back when she had just gotten accepted into the university, a wide-eyed freshman with a heart full of cautious excitement and a too well-dressed outfit. She would think about those early days, those awkward but somehow magical moments—her first class, her first time getting lost on campus, her first cafeteria lunch eaten in small talk with her 2 new friends she barely knows. The way the sun hit the main building in the mornings. The thrill of finally feeling like a “real” college student. Oh, how she wished she could go back. Not to change anything necessarily, but to feel it all again—fresh, vivid, untainted by the weight of deadlines and expectations. She yearned for a do-over, not because she regretted what happened, but because she realized, too late, how fleeting it all was. Now, as the end of her college journey stared her down, she was struck by a bittersweet truth: she hadn’t truly lived her college days to the fullest. She had gone through the motions, passed the tests, attended the classes—but somewhere in between, she had forgotten to pause and soak it all in. To savor the chaos, the friendships, the youthful freedom. It wasn’t that she hadn’t made memories—she had. But it felt like she’d been too focused on surviving college to actually enjoy it. Well, a bit too late to regret anything, isn’t it?

But fret not, despite the constant looming pressure of academic deadlines and the occasional existential spiral, Jules could still find bits and pieces of happiness in her college life. Yes, her days were stressful, and yes, the word “assignment” alone could send her into a silent internal scream, but it wasn’t all doom and gloom. After all, she had her little circle of friends, her ride-or-die thesis warriors, and that made all the difference. Despite only having 2 classes in a week, she’d head straight to her usual spot and plop down in one of the cold, slightly uncomfortable wooden chairs with her laptop, earphones, and a face full of dread. For what? Working on her thesis, duh. Then her friends will also join later, also working on their thesis. They’d greet each other with a tired wave, a yawn, or sometimes no words at all—just the solemn look of shared suffering. Then, with silent understanding, they’d spread out across a big table they claimed as their own, unpack their laptops and chargers, and begin the day-long ritual of typing, sighing, deleting, and scrolling through citation websites they still didn’t fully understand. And why didn’t they just work on their thesis at home, you ask? Hah. Bold of you to assume these girls had the mental strength for that. There exists an invisible, malevolent force in their homes—an almost demonic gravitational pull—that makes working from home impossible. You sit at your desk for five minutes, and suddenly you're lying in bed, phone in hand, watching reels of cats being dramatic or people making aesthetic bullet journals. Poof—motivation gone. That "five-minute break" turns into a nap, which turns into “I’ll just work on it tomorrow.”

So no, the library wasn’t just a place—it was their fortress. Their accountability zone. Their collective space of mutual suffering and scattered laughter. Sure, the chairs were stiff, and the Wi-Fi sometimes betrayed them, but it was the only place where they could at least try to be productive. Then, when afternoon comes, do you know what else rises up aside from the sun? Yes, hunger. After hours of typing until their fingers cramped and staring at their screens until the words blurred into abstract shapes, the girls would collectively groan and stretch like overworked cats. Their stomachs would grumble loud enough to be considered a chorus, and that could only mean one thing: lunchtime. Of course they were hungry. It’s basic biology—thinking burns energy, and their brains had been running marathons all morning. The act of untangling convoluted thesis theories and piecing together citations from sources they didn’t even remember downloading could drain a person’s sugar levels faster than sprinting uphill. So, at around one or two in the afternoon, they'd all agree—without much discussion—that it was time to take a break. A sacred thirty-minute ritual, usually involving a brisk walk to the campus cafeteria, the occasional rant about how thesis has ruined their appetite but not enough to stop eating, and a quick pause for the afternoon prayer. Jules will be the one who eat alot. She might look thin and frail, just look at those frail wrists. Well, either she got super fast metabolism or diabetes, but she actually devour like a whale. Her friends had long since stopped being surprised. At first, they used to raise their eyebrows or jokingly ask where all that food went. But now, they just accepted it. It was part of the natural order. Jules might look like a fragile thing, but once you placed a plate of food in front of her, she devoured it with the intensity of a whale during krill season. Whether it was her freakishly fast metabolism, hidden muscle mass, or—god forbid—early signs of diabetes, no one could really tell. What they did know was that food made her happy, and for a group of students whose lives were currently dominated by stress and deadlines, that was reason enough to let Jules feast in peace.

Her favorite place to pray on campus? Hands down, the mosque nestled inside the rectorate building. It was like a hidden gem among all the chaotic corners of the university—a calm, quiet sanctuary that gave her at least five minutes of peace in her otherwise turbulent academic life. What made it her favorite wasn’t just the spiritual tranquility, but the very human comforts it offered. First off, it was clean. Really clean. The kind of clean that made you sigh in relief the moment you stepped inside. The carpet felt soft under her feet, never gritty or dusty, and the air? Oh, the air conditioner was always humming softly, blessing every visitor with a cool breeze that made you want to just lie down and never leave. On especially hot days, it was like walking into heaven. Unlike other prayer rooms scattered across campus, this one had no faint—yet very present—odor of socks clinging to the air. No stifling warmth, no worn-out prayer garments thrown haphazardly in the corner. Everything here was neat and thoughtfully maintained. But perhaps the crown jewel of the experience? The prayer hijabs. Yes—actual, freshly-laundered, well-maintained prayer hijabs that didn’t smell like they had been sitting in someone’s gym bag for a week.

And then, with their stomachs full and their spirits slightly lifted, Jules and her girls would make their way back to the library. The sun outside would begin its slow descent, casting long golden streaks across the tiled floors and creating dancing shadows through the windows. They’d return to their usual spot—yes, the big table near the back corner, the one unofficially claimed as “theirs” by virtue of routine—and settle back into their seats like seasoned warriors returning to the battlefield. There were no more jokes or idle chatter by then. It was game face on. Each girl would open her laptop, plug in her charger, maybe pop on a pair of earphones, and dive straight into the merciless world of thesis writing. Fingers tapped away on keyboards with a rhythm that sounded like rain against a windowpane. Pages of references flickered across screens, and now and then, someone would sigh deeply—not dramatically, just existentially. Outside, the sky gradually turned from bright blue to a dusky orange, then to indigo, and finally black. But inside the library, time felt suspended. They didn’t notice the shift of hours, only the ever-mounting word counts, the creeping headaches, and the occasional breakthroughs that made them sit straighter and mutter, “Finally.”