I was once on a bus, overhearing a conversation amongst a couple of students (being then, and now as I write, also a student.) The air of the bus was close and damp with perspiration and irritation. Having tried for fifteen minutes to read my book above the dull roar of the vehicles inhabitants, I gave up, and attempted to convert my exasperation into something more interesting; I listened, intently. It was the sort of conversation which is at least entered into, or syntactically framed as a debate, a minor disagreement; however this was one of those most interesting forms of debate in which everyone actually agrees, yet carries on to talk over each other. I forget the beginning of the conversation (perhaps from rage at what follows,) just as I forget their precise clothing, hair, or the number of people.) But I remember keenly their discussion of their lecturers, supervisors, and the status of postgraduate study. “I could have a postgraduate so easily,” one of them said “in fact, I’ve been offered money to do so.” “Yeah,” another chipped in “me too...I wouldn’t fucking dare though y’know? That’s just for failures...for people who fail to find a place in the world.” I clenched my fist, resting lightly upon my knee. “I know right?” the first one clucked affirmatively, along with general murmuring from their cohorts. “Like all these lecturers, talking about these ideas, hanging out with kids, writing their little articles...I mean, they just have no idea; I just don’t get why they do it, they’re like children.” “Because they couldn’t adapt, they couldn’t fit into the real world, the real world after ‘university’; they couldn’t be real.” “Did I tell you I got that internship?” a deep, cut-glass voice responded. “Yeah, they are just failures really,” a new voice added. “Pathetic.” Trapped in this container, with these voices, they became inscribed into my memory, if only fragmentorily. I rang the bell, and got off early, having to walk ten extra minutes to deposit my weary and sweat-stained body at home.