PAULINA... A Life With A Difference
© OLAYEMI GRACE

EPISODE FIVE
Monday mornings were always characterized with a lot of hustles and bustles and a lot of people dreaded Mondays. Students were not left out of the Monday morning saga and most students always wished that they could skip Mondays and have double Fridays. From the early morning lectures to the long hours of lectures to the long queue at the bus terminus and the pushing and struggling to get a seat in the bus and the traffic that would make a thirty minutes journey become two hours, all these made Monday an enemy of all. Lecturers were also not helping matters as they would take attendance, give tests and not allow any student join the class once they arrived.

It was another Monday and it was evident that no one was excited about the day because they all wore long faces as they got ready for the struggle of the day.

Paulina and her roommates got ready for school and the thought of the stress of the day made them to just do their stuff in silence. Unlike other days when they would gist and giggle happily as they got ready for the day.

Paulina was a very fair and good-looking lady. She was not lousy or extravagant and she always loved to wear something simple and decent. A lot of people called her holy Mary because of the way she dressed and she would just laugh about it and reply that holy Mary was her role model and it would be a privilege to look like her.

That day was not an exception; she wore a long sleeve blue blouse on a black skirt. She packed her hair to the back and took her sandals.

“I’m not going to wait for any of you,” she said and continued buckling her sandals.

“We are almost ready madam, so calm down.” One of them said.

“The lecturer that would be taking the class I have this morning is an early riser, no matter how early you are you will always meet him in the class. At a point I began to wonder if he sleeps at all,” another said.

“Probably he spends the night in the class,” one said and they all laughed.

They got ready and set out. They headed to the bus terminus where they took the next bus down to the academic arena.

Paulina left the hostel as early as 7am for her 9am lecture. She had calculated the time to wait for the bus plus the traffic and knew that she should be able to get to the class before 9am no matter what happened.

But as God would have it, the bus arrived almost immediately they got to the terminus and the traffic was very mild. She got to the class around 7:50am, she went to secure a safe place for herself in the front of the class where she would be able to hear the lecturer well and have a clear access to the board without straining her eyes. She sat beside a lady on the second row in the front and she exchanged pleasantries with her. She said a word of prayer and took out her note book to revise what she had been taught in the course because she didn’t know if the lecturer would welcome them into a new week with an impromptu test.

She had not read for up to twenty minutes when she felt led in her spirit to preach to her other colleagues that had arrived for the lecture as well.
She took her bible in her hand and stepped up to climb the podium.

“Good morning ladies and gentlemen,” she said to get their attention because some of them were busy pressing their phones, some were reading while others were chatting with their friends.

They all stopped and looked up to see who was greeting them. On seeing Paulina, some of them hissed, others continued with what they were doing while some paid attention to her to hear what she was going to say.
To be continued...
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