Exams are something that cannot be avoided in everyday life. I honestly do not understand why they can’t just call them “Tests” instead of exams. The word “exams” sounds painful. People usually associate the word “pain” or a variation of the word to “exam” anyway.

I have done over 40 academic exams including high school exams, college exams and university exams. I’ve never been a fan, I’m sure you aren’t either. But I can recall the top 5 most interesting exams or instances that have occured in exams in my academic career from 2002 - 2006.

1. Nov 2006 - Going to my E-Commerce exam smashed.

That’s right friends, it was the bad time to be wallowing in my own self pity from a broken heart. I looked at the clock and realised that I wouldn’t have to leave for my exam for 3 more hours. No one was home. I was depressed. So I decided to polish off the bottle of Jack Daniel’s my uncle gave to me as thanks for helping him with a DVD. All of a sudden, it was 2pm - time to go - and I was still smashed. I drove to my exam drunk. I kept needing to go to the toilet which made the supervisors a bit suspicious until one of them came in the toilet with me. I called my tutor the wrong name on my exam paper, was barely able to hold up my pen and write, and left the exam after 45 minutes. By this time I had sobered up but I was so very drunk that I felt like I was going to pass out on the exam paper. I passed.

2. Last half of 2002 - I use a tampon up my nose so I can continue my exam.

For some reason, I was always one to get a cold in the beginning of summer - usually the change of seasons. My nose was running like crazy. Halfway through my English exam, I ran out of tissues as per usual. There were none in the class, so I got toilet paper from the toilets but ran out of that too. Being the awkward anti-social teenager I was, I didn’t want to keep asking to go to the toilets and in my moment of desperation, I reached into my pocket and undid the wrapper of a (mini size) tampon as slowly as a could as to not disrupt others and I put it in my nose. I was on the edge of the class so no one could see me from the right but everyone could on the left. So i bent down so far that my hair covered the side of my face. I finished my exam with a tampon up my nose.

3. The first half of 2001 - Petra chokes in the English exam.

Petra and I came up with this scheme to bring a whole bunch of food in our english exam because at the time, we hated english and didn’t care for it so we saw the exam as I big junk food fest. Although, she bought more food then I did. So I was not surprised when halfway during the exam, I hear gagging sounds coming from Petra. I look over and her face has gone red and she starts coughing. “What’s wrong?” I whispered, a little alarmed. “I almost choked on my spit after eating this” she indicated to a red licorice.

4. November 2003 - I stay in an Accounting exam for 30 minutes and get 65%.

Here’s the story - I was repeating year 12 so I repeated my accounting exam. As I’d already done accounting before, I was getting excellent marks in class until our mock exam. I failed - i got 31% for some reason that today, I still don’t know. It brought my mark from 70% to 49% which crushed my spirit greatly. I stopped being motivated to learn and try in accounting. When it was time to do my exam, I never studied. I didn’t have any notes. I just did not care. I didn’t care so much that I planned to only stay half an hour and leave which I did. And I got 65%. I either fluked it, or it was a miracle.

5. Early 2002 - Having an exam with no supervisors.

Apparently, there was a little mix up. Our class for the exam couldn’t move to a bigger class with supervisors because all the other classrooms were being used. So the supervisors in one room had to keep walking back and forth to check on us. After a while, they probably believed in the goodness of our little precious hearts and stopped coming to check on us, but sometimes made an exception if the volume got a little high. One girl kept clearing her throat so loudly that it made half of the class deaf until someone snapped at her to “shut the fuck up”. People were telling each other answers or showing each other their papers and someone blew up a condom while someone else took a lighter to it. All in all, I’d say we all passed.

I was known as an insane hippie in high school. I wasn’t popular, I wasn’t unpopular. And I was more than happy not to be classified as anything. I had a bunch of friends who the popular kids called us “rejects” because to them, we didn’t fit in anywhere. Now that I think back at it, I would much rather be a reject than be in any other social group. Rejects had far more fun because they never cared what anyone else thought about them.

By the time I got to year 12, I was suffering from a severe case of clinical depression which I often hid from my friends by being humorous and making people laugh. Because of this, no one really took me seriously or saw me as a threat. In fact, a lot of people probably saw me as someone who could be walked over because apparently I was just a clown.

I had a quick wit, make dirty jokes in regards to genitalia and various gasses and bodily fluids, I made rude comments about teachers who we collectively didn’t like, I constantly took hits at myself at the expense of other people… so it was no wonder that most of them who did not know me very well never took me seriously.

I was extremely emotional and always got angry. Even more so then than I do now. I cannot even put into words how angry and hurt and upset I was all the time for apparently no reason. But like I said, I always pushed it down. I never blew up at anyone because it wasn’t my style. However, there was one person who I had had enough of and unfortunately, my fuse was shortening at a rapid rate. She just happened to be on the receiving end of it.

She was new to school. New kids usually start of quiet and awkward, unsure of where they are going to fit in and if anyone will like them at all. But we readily accepted her because she seemed cool and she also seemed like she didn’t fit in anywhere. After about two days, I noticed something about her. She was quick to shoot people down, even if they were having a laugh. She retorted angrily to people who joked about her just to get her to have a laugh. If someone said something that was incorrect, she would correct them. She was an all out know it all. I don’t mind people who “know it all”, just as long as they don’t try to be a complete dick about it and make people feel about two inches tall. She did that to everyone.

Mind you, she was awesome to have a conversation about art with. We were both in the same art class. She loved painting and so did I so we had that in common. However, she sometimes looked down on me because I never took art seriously like she did. How could I? Our teacher was a flower eating Croatian lady who always got pissed off with Petra and I if we swore in our parents/grandparents native tongue since she could understand us. Some guys in our class thought it was funny to make a penis out of clay and put it on her desk. She called that sexual harassment and lost it. We called it the best fucking thing that happened that day and lost it laughing. Although, looking back I felt sorry for her.

I was also doing photography at the time. I had done it since year 8 and I was a keen student, constantly doing my work and more. I took great pride in Photography,  as I just saw art class as a place to muck around and paint dark and depressing portraits.

So during an art class, I decided to finish off my photography journal as I had finished my mosaic. The new girl was sitting across from me doing some artist assignment as I was doing my photography journal. Our assignment was still life and we had to find examples of buildings, structures, signs, toys.. any inanimate object that was not living. I remember pasting in a picture of the Louvre because I had always wanted to go there and I always thought it was one of the most beautiful structures in the world. She stopped what she was doing and narrowed her eyes down at me and said in a monotone:

“That’s not still life.”

I stopped what I was doing and looked up and her. She never looked me in the eyes and just looked down, disapprovingly at my work.

“Yeah it is, it’s a building.”

She still never looked at me and said in her matter-of-fact voice: “No it’s not.”

By this point, I was starting to fly off the metaphoric handle. This kind of behavior had been happening the whole time she was at school. People often made comments to me about how annoying she was or how they were intimidated by her because she made people feel stupid. I felt badly for them, but I said nothing. Now I was victim #43728947, and she was starting to make me angry. And when I got angry.. you do not want to be the focus of my anger.

“Um, yes it is. It’s a building. The Louvre.” I said, trying to contain my voice which was breaking because I was pushing down my anger. “I thought you know, you would think it’s cool.”

“But it’s not still life. There are people inside.” She said in that tone again.

I forced a smile and said, “But what if it’s night time and no one is in there? Is it still life then?”

She rolled her eyes and got frustrated with me. “Jessica, it’s not still life, ok?” She spoke to me like I was a child and that just put the final nail in the coffin.

The situation was getting tense because Petra and the other girl we shared our table with were looking at each other and then looking down trying to avoid the splatter of an impending blood bath. I looked at Petra and then I looked at miss know it all. She was looking at me, with her eyes looking down at my work. I could feel myself getting angrier and angrier. I was probably going red in the face because I felt so hot. And then, the floodgates opened.

“Do you know what?!” I snapped, “It might not be still life in your fucking world of fucking art or whatever the fuck you want to call it because you’re so fucking good at it like you fucking tell everyone else you are and make everyone feel fucking stupid for god knows whatever reason, but in photography a building is fucking still life. It’s not living. It’s made of fucking cement which I believe is fucking dead. So how about you just shut the fuck up about your worthless fucking art bullshit and stop pretending you know everything because it seems to me that you fucking well don’t.”

Of course, I do not remember the exact tirade but it did go something like that and I remember that I said a variation of the word “fuck” every second word (as it was like this in my vocab back then) and I stood up for myself and the little person. I admit that looking back and even at the time when the words escaped my mouth I regretted them because it was totally out of my character to do this.

She sat there silent and looked shocked. Petra and the other girl looked up at me in the same reaction, obviously also shocked that I said anything. I swear to god the whole class fell silent hearing my angry rant. I ignored it and said nothing and returned to my work. She never spoke to me again after that and I was secretly glad.