# data[].attributes.body
-kayden

I was dragged out of my bed at 6:45am in the morning by a pair of burly men known as Discipline and Responsibility. Reluctantly I made my way to the dining table for breakfast, however lazy I may be, I knew that if I had skipped it the wolves of hunger would be growling at my feet long before I had another chance to eat. I scarfed down my breakfast, knowing that if I missed my bus, I would risk not making it to school on time. As I made my way down to the bus stop, I saw the two buses I could take pulling out of the bus stop. I sighed in resignation. Even though the same thing had happened every day for the past two months, it still did not take the sting off having just missed the buses and needing to wait five minutes for the next one. Once I got on the bus, I relaxed a little, passing the time by reading a book. I barely get to school on time. The next few hours would be a mixture of extreme boredom and slight interest depending on whether the class was on things I had yet to understand or things I had learned long ago. And with me my two constant companions from earlier this morning tug at my ears, trying to get me to concentrate on the lesson. I could say it worked, and that I was the perfect focused student, but I wouldn’t want to lie. As the school day finally ends, I get on the bus home, similarly passing the time reading, reaching home around 2:30pm. After all, it is a deplorable habit. I spend the rest of the day getting ripped to pieces. Our dear friends Discipline and Responsibility pulling me to do my homework and the *instant gratification monkey dragging me away. Finally dinner arrives, and I help clear the table. The talk is of current events, complaints of classmates, and a few insults from sibling rivalry. After dinner, I go back to the tug-of-war. The day ends with my mom pestering me to go to sleep while I desperately scrabble to finish the homework I had not finished. As I collapse into bed, I feel the first sense of relief throughout the entire day.

*https://www.ted.com/talks/tim_urban_inside_the_mind_of_a_master_procrastinator

# data[].attributes.body
deja vu is the first thing that comes to mind when i inevitably wake from my deep slumber. its 630 when my alarm rings, but it sounds more like a foghorn. i force myself out of bed and wash up. i dont have enough time to eat breakfast nowadays. i have to get to class, but i often find myself missing a bus or stuck in a jam. whenever that happens the number of times ive been late runs through my head. its funny how it feels like im late every day. every day is a drag. when i get to school, i lumber up the seemingly never ending stairs to my classroom. That’s what they call it, but its more like an enlarged prison cell. just like prisoners, we work on strict schedules and have short lunch breaks. After the school day finally ends, i rush back home only to realise i have homework which i dont want to do. i procrastinate until dinner time and slump on my bed once im done. Soon enough the clock strikes 10 and i go to sleep. the cycle continues the next day

# data[].attributes.body
“BOOM!” a loud crash in my living room had woken me up from my sleep. It was early in the morning, streaks of light rays from my bedside window blinded my eyes as I reached for my phone next to me. I got up from my bed and stumbled while walking to the kitchen as if I was drunk. It suddenly seemed as if I had Alzheimer while I tried to remember what I was doing yesterday.

I reached my kitchen, and saw that no one was awake yet, “everyone is still asleep?” I thought to myself. Ignoring the sound I heard just now, I walked to the fridge to grab a drink before going back up to bed. As soon as I opened the fridge, a cool breeze blew into my face and it was as though there was air-con coming out of the fridge.

I quickly grabbed the first drink I saw, bolted up the stairs and in the blink of an eye, I was here again, back to the place where I was a few minutes ago. I looked outside my window, taking a sip from my drink and realised, “why is it so quiet outside, they should be up by now.” I looked over to my neighbour’s house, and saw the door wide open. My eyes widen and suddenly, my memory gets fuzzy again. I close my eyes and the next thing I knew I...

# data[].attributes.headline
‘thee cant heareth the battleth shouts’ - khushi

# data[].attributes.subject
‘thee cant heareth the battleth shouts’ - khushi

# data[].attributes.body
‘I rise up from the ground when i hear the battle shouts from both sides’ … is exactly how I feel when I get up every day. I tread toward the bathroom like there are bolts tied to my legs that I can’t get rid off no matter how hard I struggle. I like to call it anxiety or stress but my parents like to call it technology. I never try to change their way of addressing it. At least they know its there, right? Anyhow I manage to put on my uniform as soon as possible and take off with some fruit in my hand and eat gulf that while walking toward the bus stop, constantly overthinking about this emoty feeling inside of me, is it because of myself, did i do something, what did i dream about? I get on the bus and prepare for the battle I am going to fight for the day. Will it be Countess English? Or Marquess Maths? Maybe Duke Science… I check then the tools that i have to battle them against with. One thing missing for the battle and this state of dread takes over me. But, I try my best to let my enemy not know that they have the best of me. I need to do this like I have done every other battle. I either inform my fellow comrade of what I am currently missing or use an alternative weapon. I then snap out of it once the bus reaches opposite of school. I confidently walk onto the ground and switch the marching band that i continuously bring around with me off as now they can’t help me. I know I have to face the enemy myself. Once again I snap out of my imagination and wait for the assembly to get over with during which I get so dizzy and tired already. I check what time school ends and depending on that i set my clockwork to constantly work for the particular amount of time until its time for the curse to be broken with a break. Maybe all I need is a poison apple for a peace of mind? I then get my stuff ready for my next meeting with either a friend or foe. My friend Mother Tongue comes in and she slowly escorts me to the library where i sit in silence and enjoy the peace with her. After Mother Tongue ushers me back to my suite, I then take a seat on my usual spot then spend the next one hour with my former-friend-now-enemy. He had lost me two years ago when he changed. I don’t understand him as well anymore and I try to help myself see that he is still as good but my brain knows better, i think? I try to be tough and hold back the pain from my face. I really don’t want to hurt him regardless of how much he hurt me. Then my councillor comes in for a forty minutes session with food and topics to talk to my comrades about. Every time its spent differently that is why i always look forward to those. After they leave I go back to trying to be tough and meet Countless English. I have a love-hate relationship with her as sometimes she can be great but sometimes hair-ripping painful. But I like her overall, I think. After one fulfilled hour with her i meet Earl Geography. He is easy, I would call him a friend. I learn so much with him but he can be a little to much sometimes, you know? After these do I encounter the actual battle, my recovery from a draining day. I after have the same motivation as a broken wind-up toy. I still go through it with my songbird. I then realise ‘I have got to stop daydreaming!’. This feels like the millionth time i have said that to myself within the span of the day i have not even completely gone through and then demotivate myself as I overwhelm myself with this chronic fatigue that takes over me. I decide that I will do my duties with the minimal efforts that I am unable to apply without any motivation inside of me since 1998’, a time where i wasn’t even born. Near the end of the battle day, I punish myself for not doing anything. But, I promise myself to not punish my self physically like I used to but worse by degrading myself. I then somehow pull myself together and take myself to get a break by getting a daily trial of death for my measly 5 hours because of my urge to get up as early as possible. This cycle that I keep riding tires me because of myself and I don’t know how to stop it. Will it ever end? I don’t know. Will I try to stop it? I can’t take the bear the cuts from both the chains and myself, mentally at least. Then, this cycle repeats.

# data[].attributes.body
At around 7 in the morning, the sound of my mom pounding on my door wakes me from my peaceful sleep. After washing up, I get ready to go to school in my mom's car. My mom is always ready to raise hell when any car so much as swerve an inch. When I get to school, I drag my feet up the snaking flights of stairs and get ready for another day in the prison called school. Like inmates, we operate on a certain schedule and have designated mealtimes. Recess with my friends is like the light through the clouds. When school's over, and the dark stormy cloud has cleared from the sky, I go home and flop onto my bed. I am still a prisoner here. I stay in my room for hours before it is time for dinner. When that is done, I trudge back up to my room and fixate my eyes on my screen. This continues before my eyes shut. And the day repeats.

# data[].attributes.body
tw: graphic description of a panic attack

notes: watching inside out is highly recommended before reading this, but I’ll give a quick recap.

You open your eyes and groan before quickly realising something was wrong. “I’m not usually feeling like this,” you mutter as the chronic fatigue overtakes you and you want to go back to dreamland again. Your eyes start to droop, and your body instinctively goes to check the time. It’s 0954, in the middle of a math lesson, and you should concentrate.Yet despite the circumstances, you don’t feel worried, or rather, you don’t feel anything. All you know is that the funny-looking colorful people in inside out aren’t pressing any of your buttons, which is odd. You look around, only to be met with an unfamiliar room. You look at yourself, confused. “This… isn’t my body?” Purple starts going off and your chest starts rising and dropping at an alarming rate. You start racking back and forth, the intrusive thoughts charging in. Blue hides behind Red as Red joins on the piano keys, blue occasionally playing a note here and there. “Why are you always like this. You mess up at every given opportunity, you don’t deserve to be here! You should just leave, nobody will miss you either way.” “Kill them all.” “See? You’re nothing but a monster!” “Everyone probably hates you. Oh my god, oh my god, I’m freaking out, I can’t breathe.” Green has taken over the wheel. “You’re disgusting. I can see why people would treat you like crap.” The voices grow louder, hollering. They grow faster, overlapping. The buzzing in your head intensifies, and you feel like biting your arm off and tearing your hair. Breathing takes every ounce of strength you have in you and you feel an anvil weighing you down. You wait for it to stop, hoping you seem normal as you’re in a semi-public space and you don’t want to disrupt the lesson. The colours continue though, and you wonder how the owner of the body is still alive with what they have to experience everyday. You’re about to cry but you realize in this body you can’t. There is a firm dam which the waterworks are supposed to lie behind, but it’s empty. It doesn’t rain, and it’s grey. Afterwards, you ask a friend of the body’s original owner if they noticed anything amiss with you during class. “No, why?” they reply, slightly perplexed. You could only spit out a few words dumbly. “It’s nothing,” you laugh politely. Deep down though, you were weary. “Oh,” you thought. The grey islands got you again.

# data[].attributes.body
At the light of dawn, I awake from a deep slumber. The first order of the day is to eat the king’s meal. Refreshing as it may be to eat the poisoned apple again, one should be early to wake. Sleep is the enemy and ally of productivity paradoxically enough. Why I myself wish the world would be forever under the spell of night, but one should get things done if possible. I mull over the morning chores and prepare for the day ahead. All is well till I face my mortal enemy, I pick up the pen and face him. Every drop of blood spilled upon him whittles him down, and eventually he falls. Eventually the sun is high, I consume the prince’s meal and then I wander and wander, finding myself in the land of games. Hundreds and thousands of pixels make the individual pieces of art I see everyday, all of which combines into a concert for the eyes. I find myself in the grasp of the sublime stories, exquisite pieces of art and fascinating gameplay. I sink deeper and deeper until the call of the demon king himself forcefully drags me out. I am placed into a cell, confronted by my mortal enemy again, however he has been supplemented by the demon king’s power. Every word I write has little effect on him. I become the cockroach, unwilling to die, and drag this frail body on and on. When he finally dies, I come out to see the sky dark, not a single natural ray of light in sight. At last I eat the pauper’s meal, and stay in the land of games once again, without a disturbance this time. What would the day be without night, and I lay down fully awake, but unmoving. The day may not be the kindest to me, but the night is always the one comfort I have. I take a shower, the water beating against my back, relieving the fatigue I had accumulated. At last I close my eyes, unworried about the day that lies ahead, as I feel my consciousness drifting away…

# data[].attributes.body
I wake up in the morning at around 6, still trying to catch some Zs, my eyes still shut as if there was something weighing them down. As I get up the sky is still dark as death with a tint of light mixed into it.

When I arrive at school, I walk into the classroom only to be greeted by an overly energetic atmosphere and the surface of the sun. But nevertheless the shadow following me doesn’t change its mood. The periods following the event of my arrival at school seem to be a brick wall except maybe recess, the atmosphere remains unchanged due to many factors such as how the classroom is basically one big sauna. I barely get over the day without causing trouble only to be met with the anxiety of finishing my homework.

School comes to an end with many wearing the same smile they had in the morning, seemingly completely unfazed by the brick wall. I head home and make the most out of this period of freedom.

..ian

# data[].attributes.body
-
Its commonly said that the eyes are the window to the soul. Yet, every morning, the only thing that passes through this pair of mirrors are rays of yellow light, allowed in by the literal windows of my house. I force myself to get up on my two props, though there are anvils hanging from my eyelids. I rub my eyes. I rub my eyes again, this time giving me clear sight of the time. “God, its my own fault, I shouldn’t have stayed up for that Euro game, “ I mumbled. I drunkenly trod my way to the bathroom, freshening up and getting ready like i always do on a crappy school day like today.  Sitting down and eating a meal is a luxury i never get to enjoy. My stomach churns in protest as petrol is being constantly channeled into my figurative fuel tank while I simultaneously stumble onto the bus.  As the bus pulls into the bus stop, i look upon the large slab of concrete before my eyes. I join the mass of inmates as they lifelessly trudge along the walkway of this drab penitentiary. Muse’s “Map Of The Problematique” plays from my earbuds, suiting the mood perfectly as its otherworldly lyrics and rhythmic, mournful riffs chug on. Music was the only handhold left i could grab to prevent myself from falling into the abyss of infinite boredom. At that moment the lines from the verse start to play, “I want to be free, From desolation and despair…”.

Lessons are never ending torture sessions. These waves of figures, words and images slice my head open like a scalpel does in a lobotomy. Ah, finally. Recess stumbles along. As i walk to the canteen, my three friends brazenly crack jokes, and the optimistic mood they provoke jolts me back to life. I find myself able to grin again, as my heart starts to pulsate with life.

At the end of the day, we finally get released on parole. I head to the bus stop with my friends, the 1 tonne rock on my back lugging and slowing me down. Yet i felt being weighed on by something far greater , the sheer amount of weekend homework assigned. On the bus, my friend yammers away while reading his Anime comic. I am not listening, but I am contemplating the lyrics of a song. How fitting that the same song accompanies both the start and the end of my cloudy day. The chorus starts to play, “Loneliness be over…When will this loneliness be over…”. I chuckle. How ironic. My eyes gradually close as the metal vessel brings me closer and closer to home.

# data[].attributes.body
a typical day in my life is like a cycle. everyday i wake up to the same typical alarm sounding, crashing back onto bed after pressing the snooze button, but another five minutes later the alarm screams in my ears again. the typical daily cycle repeats itself like clockwork. i drag my feet out of bed, brush my teeth, wolf down my breakfast and then head to school. once i reach my classroom, i hear the loud chattering and laughter of my classmates bouncing off the walls and into my ears. the day goes by like a slow ticking clock, and with each and every second, i grow more and more tired. after a dreaded infinity of being confined to my very typical desk, the school bell rung to rescue me from my agony and i made a beeline for the door of the classroom; it was almost like i could envision a clear path to the exit. i felt like the rabbit from wonderland, checking the time every few steps towards the bus stop to make sure i was not late for my bus. after a few minutes of waiting at the bus stop, my bus crawled to a stop in front of my eyes and i hopped on, feeling the cool air conditioned air wrap me in a comforting embrace, saving me from the angry scorching heat of the early afternoon. i felt myself drift away into my own wonderland - the land of sleep - as i sat down in one of the empty seats. once i reached my stop, i jolted home to the marshmellow-soft bed waiting for me in my room and readied myself for yet another typical day which in other words is called tomorrow.

# data[].attributes.body
My morning starts off like clockwork, it is super fixed, but sometimes im lazy. So the morning routines are as boring as watching Big Bang Theory. Other than waking up, watching tv and doing my morning routine, the day is just as bleak as fog. Well so in the morning im as unalive as sans the skeleton, sometimes i dont even speak i just do my stuff and get it done and over it. It’s that bad.

But, laziness has its perks. I can laze around and do whatever i like, without a care in the world.it’s super nice, and um i just play genshin as well. Sometimes i do work in the morning, but that’s besides the point.

Anyways, moral lesson of the story is that ‘laziness has its perks’

# data[].attributes.body
by Eunice

Upon entering the bus, I am met with a sea of unfamiliar faces. More often than not,  I will come across some “aunties” who use their bags to hog with seats. I glance around, scrambling to find a seat but to no avail. I sigh. Another endurance test is about to come.

After standing for half an hour straight, my knees finally had some legroom to budge. As I moved it the slightest bit, it felt as if a thousand needles were mercilessly poking it. The more I walked, the more it felt as if my legs were giving up on me. I am a fighter, a warrior. I must push on. With all my might, I continued limping home. I was met with more rude stares.

As I continued the journey, thousands of thoughts started racing through my mind. “Did I do anything wrong today? Did I hurt anyone’s feelings? What do my classmates think of me?” Sometimes I just wished my thoughts could understand that they did not have to compete with one another…

# data[].attributes.headline
“All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players“ 

# data[].attributes.subject
“All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players“ 

# data[].attributes.body
carrie-anne
The day begins with the usual shout from my cast mates, signalling my call to the stage. I start my usual routine to get ready for the performance, donning my costume and taking a meal in the dressing room while getting my hair fixed. The moment i step on stage i am greeted with the scorching heat of the spotlight. It seems particularly bright today, leaving me sweaty and with spots of heat rash splashed across my face. My character does several side quests, as per usual on most Sundays, which i find almost definitely worse than the big ones i have to do on most weekdays. After a long day of suffering through very unnecessarily early quests and preparing for another particularly perplexing scene that my character will have to do tomorrow (with the strange code name “Math Quiz 3”), I retire to my dressing room and settle in for the night. Of course, my performance today was flawed, occasionally earning the scathing bite of my cast members or angry lectures from my directors. I know very well that performances can be difficult sometimes, and they often leave me feeling exhausted, upset, or just plain depressed, but, as a wise person once said, all i can do is embrace the pandemonium, and find happiness in the unique insanity of being here, now.

# data[].attributes.headline
“My Back Hurts And So Do My Feelings, But Whatever” by Syafiqah

# data[].attributes.subject
“My Back Hurts And So Do My Feelings, But Whatever” by Syafiqah

# data[].attributes.body
I wake up at around 5.40 in the morning, my eyes basically glued shut and my hair in the same state as a wooden house after a tsunami. It takes me a while to register anything happening, as my brain works at about the same speed as a Windows 98 computer with 3 tabs open and internet speed slower than a sloth. I reluctantly climb out of bed, wishing that Saturday would come quicker. After a quick shower, I get ready for school and leave the house at 6.45. Once I reach the side gate, I check my watch, hoping I have enough time to just walk up to class instead of sprinting up the seemingly endless staircases. I get that the school is built on a hill, but the amount of stairs feels unnecessary. I get to class, audibly dying as I attempt to catch my breath. Soon, class starts and the day truly begins.

As the day progresses, I get noticeably less energetic, and a lot hungrier. My thoughts blur together, and even the occasional coherent thought makes less sense than a shark and a zebra playing chess in a refrigerator. From around 11am to 1pm, my energy levels are at their lowest and the chances of me falling asleep in class rise exponentially. The classes aren’t even boring, I’m just losing energy like an orange loses juice in a blender. The energy loss increases in speed when it’s windy or raining. At this point, I am helpless as the vacuum of life sucks up the dust bunnies of my energy from the old floor that I am. All of a sudden, school ends. It’s as if it never happened in the first place. And yet, so much time has passed. Sometimes I go home with my friends, sometimes I don’t. Either way, my mind goes wild, full of dreams, wonder, torment, and cursing my senior from CCA, whom I choose to believe is the main cause of my seemingly eternal back pain. I arrive at my home, the one place on Earth where I don’t have to worry about acting like a normal person.

After several hours of procrastinating while knowing full well that I’ll end up sleeping at 2am again if I procrastinate, I reluctantly open up my bag, put my papers and writing materials on my desk, and half-heartedly do my homework (and also procrastinate some more.) I am simply a fish, tangled up in the confusion and chaos that is Chemistry. Somewhere from 10pm to 2am, I finally finish my homework and pack my bag. I lay in bed after setting my alarm for 5.40am the next day, waiting for slumber to overcome my tired, restless mind, having accepted the fact that I would only get 3 hours of sleep that night and that my eye bags would likely forever remain darker than the night sky. As I finally begin to fall asleep, a tiny burst of energy sparks in my brain for one final thought.

“Ah dang, I’ve got PE tomorrow.”

# data[].attributes.body
The creamy sun fills the sky

as the grass dances to the wind

A voice whispers from beyond the clouds -

“WAKE UP!”

I open my eyes

and the wonderland is gone

In its place is my dull room

with no golden sun and no dancing grass

I am no longer a bunny in the meadow

I am a girl who has to get ready for school

I pull myself out of bed

and brush my teeth

I stare blankly at my reflection in the mirror

and i wonder

What if I was born as someone else?

Who would I be?

What if I was born as a washing machine?

Is it possible to become a washing machine?

But my string of thoughts is cut

as my brother yells at me to hurry up

So I take my time

I eat my breakfast

On today’s menu is peanut buttered bricks

how appetising

“I am so tired today”

is what I say to try to get my dad to chauffeur me to school

And it works

so I get into the car

I listen to my playlist

and it takes on a rollercoaster of emotions

But soon I see the cold school building

and I am flung off the rollercoaster

and thrown into an ocean

a deep dark ocean

School is a scary ocean

and I am a lost and drowning fish

Can fish drown?

I am definitely drowning

I swim to class

and I see my classmates

My classmates are sharks

attacking task after task

And I watch them in awe as a struggling fish

a struggling fish with thalassophobia

My gills nearly stop functioning as I inhale gallons of information

Did you know that babies have around 100 more bones than adults?

That’s what I learnt in biology today

I would love to be a baby

I almost fade off to sleep

but I see the clock hand five minutes away from dismissal

and I become a dolphin

Dolphins are apparently the happiest underwater creatures

The end of the school day finally comes

and I swim home

I am a sailfish

heading straight home at 70mph

When I am home I am a bear

I crawl into my cave and hibernate

I sleep

and sleep

and sleep

And once again I am with the dancing grass,

basking in the sunlight.

# data[].attributes.body
Every morning of my life is pretty much the same, a race against time, I always win. Pulling myself out of my slumberland, I change into something called “uniforms”, all my cell mates have the same one. Gobbling up my breakfast, I enter a moving device that makes sure I get chauffeured to my jail.

As I walk into the gates of misery, the bars that stop us prisoners from escaping, I see my inmates all drunk with fatigue. I headed to my first “lesson”, more like a job or requirement, “Physical Education”. As we sat at our designated seat, I drown in the different noises around me, the early birds call, my cell mates voices. “I’m going to take our attendance!” A voice slapped me across the face. We all have names that we go by, like how prisoners have their cell numbers.

Lessons after Lessons,  my brain juices gone, and my brain lagging every 10 seconds, a huge tension in my head starts to annoy me like a bee in my ear. I try to fight the tension by gulping down lots of water. I look at the reflective screen in front of me only to see how dead I look.

“Thank you class” We were dismissed. As I try not to go back to slumberland in the moving device, I think about the events that occured during the day.

# data[].attributes.body
stella
the test subject

Every day runs like clockwork. I go to the same place. I eat the same food. I meet the same people and I wear the same clothes.

Every morning I head to the giant building that looms over us people call school. Kids around my age wear the same red and grey clothing that would swallow us in utter discomfort , With hair pulled back into slick ponytails or cut to a style hanging right above their eyebrows. We walk through these cold metal gates that run shivers down my spine up till this day. What are these gates? Metal detectors? Are we robots? Maybe we are. Is the conclusion I usually end up with.

It’s like we were programmed to enter this building every morning. Listen to people shove information into our systems. Be evaluated with a test every few months. Maybe we are all just test subjects.

School begins with the national anthem and pledge. What is this song anyways? Are we worshiping a God in this foreign language? Who are we pledging allegiance to? Questions like such subconsciously flood my mind.

It’s lesson time. Each kid sits at our designated seat which was ice cold to the touch. These strange creatures walk into our classes by the hour. They look just like us. two arms, two feet and one nose. But something about them boomed with authority. they were allowed to reprimand us and nobody would dare to object. They looked over everything we did. Watched us like a hawk, and loomed over us like a tall tower.

They would walk in one by one. Coming in as another one exited. They would write things on the board with squeaky markers that pierced our ears and asked questions as if we were programmed to know the answers to. What was the point? How would we apply this when we get out of here? Would we even get out?

# data[].attributes.body
jiaxuan
“Hey cover me!” indeed it did after I got into a tug of war and it reluctantly gave in. Pulling it over myself with satisfaction I sink into the fluffy cloud until sound of shrilling alarm pierced through the darkness like a slash of lightning bolt splitting the darkness into two. It was like fog around me and I couldn’t make sense of the things around me but dragged myself out of bed anyway. A slice of light attacked my vision the moment I switched on the light. Within moments I was dressed up, cleaned and devouring my breakfast to fill my to-eat-list in my stomach.

Within moments I was on my way to get my daily dose of laugh, plugging in my earpiece, I closed my eyes as I let the audiobook drown out the frustration from the vehicles.

“how to do””wait what””I don’t get it” has became a reply to problems and confusions in the classroom as I looked towards my friend beside me, only to get the reflection of the same confusion. Shrugging it off, the clouds in me began to turn into rain and every drop got heavier and heavier as seconds ticked by. Puddles became rivers and rivers flow out to sea. The sounds around me started drowning out as I emerged myself into my own lalaland.

Problems are grains of sands that fill up and becomes a beach and frustrations are what we write on them. As easy as written, we should also learn how to wash them off with every interval wave.

# data[].attributes.body
BEEP BEEP BEEP!

The torturous blare blast into my ears. I jolted out of bed, sweat falling off my forehead as my chest raised up and down, panting as if I were to explode. I turned to see my bed, which like a wet rag in the sea, was soaked in my sweat. Getting up, I start up my engine and briefly stumble into the bathroom. Cold water pierces through my skin, the dim light on the ceiling gently caresses the dark room as i stare into the mirror while scrubbing my teeth. My reflection stares back at me smirking “another day huh, same old loop heh?” it says. Ignoring it I finish my icy cleanse and dress into my white shirt splattered with red.

I finish my routine, skipping my usual consumables.  Exiting the house, everything passes in a blur. The sky is still dark and the cacophony of sounds surround me. Unbothered, I put in my earpieces and listen to the same music I listen to everyday. Stepping into the giant motor beast, I sit slouched against its windows as I begin my journey to the concrete asylum.

Another day, another cycle. I brush past my lessons, barely remembering the brief concept that the blindingly optimistic figures stuff into my memory space. Figures all around me mumbling, chatting, whispering. All this noise swirls around me as I shrink into the empty cavern of my mind. “Daniel!” A voice calls out to me. I know who it is but as if I was in a trance I stare back blankly. I understand what she says but so what if I respond, I think to myself. Listen, respond, laugh, follow instructions, like a robot I carry out these activities like clockwork.

Finally as day breathes its final breath, I lie back onto my spring loaded sleep spot as I stare into the window. My reflection faintly shows in the mirror. It turns to look at me and says “look who’s back! How was your day? Oh I forgot, it was the same as every other day wasn’t it?”. Grinning tauntingly at me is ask “you know this too dont you? living like a lifeless machine. Is this really worth living for?”. I close my eyes and mutter “well, I’ve been in this loop for pretty long now so it has to be…right?”. “I’ll just answer that question tomorrow” I tell myself as my consciousness slowly slips away and I fall into sweet slumber.

(To continue, read it from the top again.)

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My lifeless eyes open as the show starts. I am a mere marionette and my owner is putting on the same show, my stiff body forced to follow the same script. I try to coax my sleepy soul to enter my body to give me vitality and life, only for it to say no. I continue my quest to last 24 hours without it. I put on a fake smile as I walk out and move onstage.

I traverse through the dark stage, making it to the main setting of the play, labelled TA32. I look around as the lights start shining onto the platform. I say hi to the others, them being the only source of interaction. I look towards the window. The mechanical wooden models of the trees and animals make up the scenery I wished to be in, but alas, I have been confined to a single room, putting on a show for a non-existent audience.

“The concentration of the solution is the mass of the solute…” I listen as I process word by word. My brain is a laggy school computer on which the google chrome icon had been spammed, only for 31 tabs to open, 17 of them not responding and music blasting out of an unidentifiable tab. After barely an hour the computer is stuck on the blue screen of death as the system tries to restart itself, only to crash and make the situation worse.

The grey, lifeless theatre slowly begins to gain vitality as school ends. The people rushing by, the bright sun and the breeze blowing by brings me comfort. I move back to the first setting, where I finish a stack of work, and rest until the next day arrives. The papers I receive leave my mind in a mess as I desperately try to comprehend the content. After struggling to finish as my puppeteer fumbles with my wooden bars, I go backstage. I watch as my strings slowly fall and my consciousness fades, knowing full well that this is the only show I was destined to put up, as my amateur marionettist struggles to memorise a different script.

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The Battle Against Darkness and Pigeons — Venise

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The Battle Against Darkness and Pigeons — Venise

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My day starts off like a canon. My eardrums are blasted the moment I rouse and then, it’s like a race against time. Clothes on, hair brushed, a slap of cold water in the face and I’m off. My quest takes me through battle with darkness and pigeons and after multiple spars, I finally arrive at sanctuary, the train station. School for me goes more or less like clockwork, sometimes a cog gets stuck and there’s a lull but most times the circuit gets rewired and things get interesting. But real fun starts when the circuit breaks. Stop, wait. There’s a maze here, oh and another there. Some of them are pretty difficult to surpass, others practically take no time at all. But they do seem to be coming out of the same place — that rock I lug to school every day. It takes almost every ounce of strength and wit I have to navigate through them, the hardest of them all requiring me to resort to desperate measures — hem, hem google. But once I’m finally done with them, I get to do whatever I want. Youtube, books, WhatsApp, you name it, I’m on there. It’s a shame then, that it always seem to happen when the sky goes dark. I sometimes ache to close my eyes…

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A lot of people like to describe their lives as a roller coaster ride. But mine is pretty much the exact opposite. My life is pretty much the most uneventful life you will ever see. Everyday is pretty much the same. My life is pretty much flatter than Australia. In a few words I would call my life an endless battle to survive. That day was no different. From the start of the music that is played to signify the start of the battle to the last minute of it, I was constantly fighting. Various enemies come at me throughout the day. The first enemy is known as ‘Science’. And this battle lasts for an hour and 20min. This is a battle of knowledge and the winner is the one who is the most knowledgeable. The next battle is against an enemy called ‘Mathematics’. This on the contrary is a battle of endurance. The winner is the last one standing. On that very day I just so happened to be competing against a bunch of people who were elites at this battle which meant that I had to become an ant if I wanted a chance to win. I have no clue how I managed to build up enough stamina to last myself through those two battles but unfortunately it does not end there. After those two battles, we get our reward which are a bunch of tasks. This in contrast is a race against time to complete these tasks before the next day. So basically I am constantly fighting battles or completing tasks just so that I can escape from the torture of being punished by the people who plan these battles. In the end, if you ask me I would say that it is not worth it but I have no idea what punishment would be given to those who fail their tasks and battles and I have no plans of finding out in the near future.

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On a school day I rise before the sun does load up my game. I somehow know that my avatar slips into his uniform, brushes his teeth until they are squeaky clean, even though all I can see is a black loading screen. Once the loading is done I reluctantly log into “school”.

As I slowly sync up with the system, and regain my senses, I hear them play the National Anthem and Pledge, a sign that the battles are about to begin. I look behind me, 27 other warriors to face the threat with me. I smile, happy that at least I have friends to face the enemy with.

I hear footsteps, my instincts take over, I get ready for the fight and watch as that familiar enemy they call “Science” prepares to attack. The bell rings, and the enemy launches a powerful pincer attack. I think to myself “how could I possibly survive 1 hour and 20 minutes of this?” We exchange blows and at long last the first battle ends, it's a draw.

As much as I wanted to rest, I could hear the signs signifying the start of the next battle. The enemy this time was an S ranked beast, known as “Math”. Another hour goes by and the fight ends in another draw.

2 more battles later, draw after draw, at long last the battles are over. Just as I was about to log out, I remembered that at the end of every day a new quest pops up “practice sets, worksheets and sls packages” but the reward? Another day without punishment. All these difficult compulsory quests yet there is nothing to gain but everything to lose.

This is the warzone that I fight in, the frightening place they call school.

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I wake up and glance at my table - a mountain of worksheets to revise. I need to get started before it snowballs till it becomes completely insurmountable. Procrastination has been unkind to me and it has filled my brain advertising YouTube, and not revision. I prepare my breakfast and gobble it up. I then leave my home. The path to the bus stop is secluded at 6.40 in the morning and the darkness swallows me up. My heart hammers and I look around cautiously, for any wolves waiting to pounce on me. There it is - the vehicle carrying me to my doom. I step inside. There are other people, handcuffed to some rectangular device. 30 minutes later, the fences invade my vision. Ruthless things, preventing prisoners from escaping. I head to my cell, called TA37 for some strange unknown reason, which I share with 27 other inmates.

8.00am. The school day starts. The tsunami is approaching, wave after wave. There's no time to breathe and I'm drowning in confusion. My battery is draining rapidly during classes, listening to the Siris talk. They talk in different voices but one thing is common - they talk even when you aren’t in the right mental state to listen and when you don’t even understand what they are saying.

At the end of school, my battery level is at 1%. I quickly leave. Obviously, I need to recharge but how am I going to do that when the destruction caused by the tsunamis has to be dealt with?

At home, I begin climbing the gargantuan mountain. It is steep and tall. I almost fall multiple times but I hold on. I’m almost at the peak. The climb is tiring but when I have succeeded in reaching the top, satisfaction bubbles in me. I then immerse myself in the virtual world - YouTube. The slow tides of videos caress me. When my eyes are drooping, I lie in my coffin. A few minutes later, I am dead to the world.

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On a typical day, I would go to school and learn

so that when I grow up, I can earn.

Getting up at the crack of dawn and doing my morning routine,

I keep thinking “Why must l wake up so early? I’m just a teen.”

I would always rush like a stream of fire,

since reaching school early was always my desire.

Learning is like climbing a mountain,

and the amount of work is an overflowing fountain.

The loads of homework and revision left to do is overwhelming,

just look at the worksheets on my desk, it’s pretty telling.

Finishing the assignments that were weighing on my mind and not allowing me to slack,

it was like finding a needle in a haystack.

I would spend so many hours on finishing it that when I’m done and I can finally flee,

a wave of relief would wash over me.
Feeling quite tired from the work, it’s quite a lot, I cannot disagree,
I watch some YouTube and feel as calm as the midnight sea.
As the time ticks to night from afternoon,
I know I’ll need to wind down soon.

Feeling tired from the work and play,

I would see the light at the end of the tunnel when I finally go to sleep and wait for the next day .

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I wake up at the crack of dawn, and eat breakfast. Then, I take off from home to school. On the journey, I listen to music that covers me in a blanket of warmth and happiness. Once I reach school the mood changes as laughter like a chime of bells fill the classroom. I spend my day going through mountains of lessons. After school,  I run like a cheetah to the bus stop and hop onto the bus. When transferring from one mode of transport to another I would always be in a race against time. Arriving home, I run through a hot bath and gobble up my food.  After taking a 20minutes power nap, I dig out my math materials and start studying. I burned the midnight oil and before I knew it, and it was way past my bedtime. I then end my day by watching my favourite 30 minutes entertainment show.

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I slipped into my glass slippers and left my Château. Stepping into my pumpkin carriage, I scanned through the interior and found myself a spot in the back seat. I stared out the window and caught myself indulged in the sight of a silky smooth velvet cloak that has been thrown over the world. I broke away from my trance when I heard a familiar voice beside me. The woman next to me got into a fight with another passenger again. Not wanting to be dragged into the war of words, I hesitantly rose up from my seat and walked forward to claim another spot. I put on my headphones and closed my eyes, now indulging in the ocean filled with schools of fishes in my head.

“So if you look here, we can see that Set B is a proper subset of Set A…” I was lost in the current. Everyone is understanding what Mr Muran is saying but my thoughts were drowning me, I could feel the remaining oxygen in me leaving my body. How could anyone understand this topic? I was in an open ocean, but still surrounded on all sides. Meanwhile, they were all on cloud nine, eagerly discussing their answers with each other as they start to discover the correct method.

Grabbing all the fishes I had around my head, I turned around to face my friend. “Sorry, could you help me with this question? I’m not sure how I should solve this.” As if she was a fairy that had descended from the sky, without a second to waste, she immediately started helping me, “Bippity Boppity Boo!”. With every word she says, I could feel the fishes around me swim away, and the bright sun is now shining onto me. I finally knew how to solve the question!

No matter how tired I was from that school day, I skipped across the soft clouds as I slowly reach the entrance of the golden gate. Problems and distractions are the water of our lives that sometimes flood our perfect world. However, the satisfaction we get when we emerge from the waters and lift our heads up to the sky is like the glimmer of a comet in the night blanket, as precious as the glass slippers given to my royal soul. 🌊⛅️

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The stillness of my room was shattered by shrill cry of my alarm clock which, like an ambulance speeding through a dark night, cried “Emergency! Out of the way! The patient’s life is on the line!”

Well… my life may not have been on the line, but my job certainly was, if I stayed in bed another minute.

With the reluctance of an immigrant bidding farewell to her motherland, I left the warm embrace of my duvet. I had been dreaming, I think, though all that remained now were vague images, blurred by the heavy fog of my waking consciousness.

(to be continued...)