Rachel’s Ramblings: Life after high school

The only thing cooler than being a teenager is being a popular one! This isn’t just in the movies but in our very own schools. Though it is a shame that not everyone can stand up and say they enjoyed their high school days. Take Jacqueline for example; she went to a very expensive private school but has nothing polite to say about high school. “It was more like a show of who had what. The prettiest girls always moved together and that went for the boys too!” There is not a country on this planet that has not experienced the different cliques of students. You’ll have the rich kids, the not so much but trying to be rich kids, the cutest girls you’ll ever see in your life and the boys who make school worth going to! Still in one enclosure you’ll have the not-so-cute but all over the place kids, you know the ones that cover up their not-so-great looks by being totally destructive. Then there are the bookworms, the ones that have no social life whatsoever but always have the last laugh every end of term when reports are out! Yes, these cliques are all over the globe and high school wouldn’t be complete without them. But as we grow older we ask ourselves why it was so important to live a certain way in high school. ‘You couldn’t afford to let kids find out you were broke in school otherwise you’ll be the next school anthem!’ says Jacqueline. Brenda Kwiz 23 year, says she was bullied and terrified to her very soul by a girl, students called ‘terminator’. “She always used to pick on me, maybe because I was so little or maybe I always looked scared, I don’t know really. But after one term I told my mum I would commit suicide if she took me back there.” I don’t know if this if fate or destiny but as we speak, the so called ‘terminator’ works for Kwiz at her salon in town today. I bet she does not feeling half as powerful as she did in school! There is a bigger world out of high school and it doesn’t care if you were the prom queen, Ferrari driving joke, Undertaker sized bully or the biggest nerd in school! You can bluff your way through high school but you can’t bluff your way through life! “Beauty comes with a price and the way I see it, most of these really pretty girls in school ended up just obsessing with their looks because that’s what everyone else was doing,” says Kwiz. The funny thing is that even in the not so glamorous schools, keeping up appearances has always been the norm. You will find kids literally embarrassed to be seen with their parents because they arrived holding stuff in a sack with jackfruit peeping from the corners. I know that this scene can do serious damage to your social status but these are your parents we are talking about; you know the ones who will pay for your University tuition when your grades don’t make sense! Right now, it is too late for some of us to correct what we could have done better in high school and all we can hope for now is for our children to be more grounded and pray that the urge to live in the fabulous lane doesn’t catch up with them! rachelgaruka@yahoo.co.uk