Every person you’ll see in your exams this week

It’s that time of year again. Hallward is your new home, the desk is your bedroom, the cafe is your dining room and the books are your only friends. Then comes the chronic anxiety, mental block and trauma of the exam hall itself. Everyone’s taking the same test, but not everyone is prepared in the same way. Whether you’re sitting next to the nervous and fidgety or the calm and complacent, here’s how to identify your fellow brothers and sisters in arms.

Optimists

They’re a bit delusional. They’ve probably googled brain foods or think karma owes them one. Instead of tackling past papers, they abandoned revision weeks ago to focus on inner peace. Most likely they’ll be giving themselves a pep talk whilst you’re looking at them. During the exam you’ll see them smiling vacantly out the window or practicing breathing exercises.

Social butterflies

Skinny chai pls

Starbucks’ best customers, they congregate with others of their kind to talk studying, and how they don’t do it.  Often you’ll have seen them move in herds around Hallward, clueless as to why the place exists for a reason other than snapchat stories. Nobody told them this exam is worth half their final mark. They’ll be looking around the room, chewing their pen, starting to feel a bit sheepish about how thick that answer booklet is.

Nervous wrecks

Workin’ hard or hardly workin’ amirite?

They’ve been watching that clock tick for 10 minutes now. Maybe they felt prepared once – a long time ago – then the words stopped going in. You saw them glaring at their notes until the invigilator made the last call. Their eyes: deep, dark and desperate, dart back and forth at the door, planning their escape. They’re stressing you out.

The whatever they’re on, you want it

They’re either stoked on coffee or enough Ritalin to kill a horse. Extra paper? Its been 15 minutes mate. Just hope those pages they’re writing are absolute waffle, they’re bound to crash soon.

Givers of no fucks

Maybe daddy’s passing over the family business, or they have a crazy new idea for a dating app. Or maybe they’re just plain lazy? Are they drunk? You can’t fathom their illogical confidence in the face of what must be certain failure. A combination of trackies and a hoodie (or even pyjamas) will be their style. Before the exam they’ll have been bragging about how much they don’t care. During the exam they’ll be slouched so far back in their chair they can barely reach their desks.

Machines

These are the guys that go through a whole notepad for one exam. Their IQ is quadruple your own (probably), making them some sort of miracle child. The worst part is, these people work hard and play hard. They stumbled straight from Stealth and into the exam hall. How the fuck do they do it?

Know it alls

Competitive, pretentious, annoying. They’re the ones in your seminar whose hands are always up. They preach modesty and hardship but you know they’re planning to be your boss. As a rule, they read the chunkiest and most difficult to read literature known to Hallward. They are your mortal enemies. Is that them laughing at you from across the room?