Team Ahimsa Blog Relay, Various Contests

Day Seven: AN INCONVENIENT BIRTHDAY - BLOG RELAY, JUDGED

Day Seven: AN INCONVENIENT BIRTHDAY

Words: 627 (including the note)

I strongly advise all to-be parents to carefully plan the time of conception so that the child doesn't appear on Earth on the day that will, in future, mark the last exam of the year.

Especially when the last exam happens to be the Chemistry Practical exam, held in the laboratory. And, should parents be as careless as to conceive in such a way, to at least name the child alphabetically early, not 'Sonali'. Those with alphabetically-later names end up in the last batch of the Chemistry Practical, and their friends gain freedom before they do.

Anyway, there I was on my fourteenth birthday, measuring out the ingredients for some potion or other chemicals needed for the experiment, listening to the teacher's anxious announcements that oscillated between 'watch out for the flames on your Bunsen Burners' and 'keep all the windows open or it'll get too hot in here' and 'you have just half an hour left, girls, hope you're progressing.'

I was sweating, sure that my test-tube did not need to contain a viciously green compound at that stage of the proceedings, when a voice at the open window startled me. "PSSST. Sonali." I gave a violent jerk and the green thingie was all over my chemistry journal. "Sorry," the voice stated. "It's just that we've baked you a cake and are about to finish it so I came here to give you the last piece."

"I don't want cake now," I muttered.

"SONALI BHATIA!" the teacher's voice thundered. "What are you whispering? I thought you were a good girl, surely you're not cheating?"

Medha's head had disappeared from the window. I had no evidence. "Er – I was scolding myself for spilling some green stuff, Miss," I stammered.

"Clean it up at ONCE," she barked. I walked to the front of the laboratory, where she was holding out a rag for me to clean the mess. Since my table was at the back, near the window, and I had to weave my way through experimenting classmates and their Bunsen Burners, it took me a bit of time to fetch the rag and get back to my table.

When I got to it, I found a paper hat there, and a bottle of Coke. "No place for a plate with the cake on, so we are going to eat it," hissed a voice. I didn't dare respond. I cleaned up the green stuff but it had pretty much soaked my carefully-drawn diagrams by then.

I had forgotten the chemistry question. I re-read it, put the paper cap and Coke bottle on the floor, and re-started everything.

"You have ten minutes!"

Ten minutes? No way I'd be done in ten minutes. I was so distracted I didn't even realize that a hand was making its way into the window. It was only when I found my mouth forcibly filled with cake that I knew something was amiss again, and, due to the aforesaid cake, I couldn't even make a sound. The hand waved, and disappeared.

"Girls, I've been instructed to give ten minutes extra to anyone who needs it, if they speak up now."

"Ummmmf" I uttered, trying to make my voice heard through the cake. "Fffggg."

"Nobody? Good girls. I'll collect your papers on time then."

It is NOT very convenient to fail Chemistry on your birthday. Please don't put your child in such a situation. Plan your pregnancy. Let your child be born on a holiday. Or an ordinary school day. Or national hippopotamus day. Or something. Not on future Chemistry-Practical day. Please.

I guess I know what you're asking ▼

Is this true?
Well, my birthday did fall on an exam day sometimes. The rest of it — hey, I'm a writer, and I have an imagination!