On the last day of classes

On the morning of the last day of classes, I woke up and mailed my first ever vote in a Singapore election enclosed in an overseas-voter envelope. It felt like a symbol of my reintegration into adult life. This is the end of a good four years — long enough for me to call it an era — of giving myself grace to be a student and grow from my mistakes.

I simply cannot process what it meant that this was my last day of classes — ever. It was like any other insignificant day, and life felt like it had to carry on as per usual. The shuttle buses still ran late, the sun was offensively bright, and my feet still carried me instinctively to the classrooms I had to be in even as my thoughts drifted. However, some subtle shifts had left this immense discomfort in the corners of my heart that keeps me up and writing this reflection instead of catching up on sleep. I cannot understate the monumental shift in gravity as my Japanese class filled with sweet treats for an end-of-year party, or when my Hebrew teacher did not say יתפגש מחר “let’s meet tomorrow” at the end of class. It is the disruption of routine, and the impulse to cry during celebration, that makes things my impending graduation real.

On the last day of classes, I spent the rest of the afternoon grocery shopping, cooking, and dinnering with my Hebrew class. I missed out on three other events I was supposed to attend. I did not check my email for the rest of the day. For the first time in a long while, it felt like I had fully lived a day instead of just passing through it — with all of its oddly touching mediocrity — and I would not have my last day in college any other way.

And this is only the start of many goodbyes. How can I bear this sadness besides crying a lot? I try my best to smile as I depart, but I feel like I have lost something forever when I leave this place. It goes without saying that there are all the personal goodbyes I must bear with all my friends here, but today, on the last day of classes, I suddenly realise that I will miss being a student here too. I wish I had one more year, or maybe the classrooms would be exempt from the passage of time and I never have to stop coming to it.

I wish I had started my language classes earlier. It is apt to end with both my language classes, because they make obvious what I treasure the most about my time as a student at Harvard. I feel forever indebted to the professors because I can never make clear the immense gratitude to be inspired by them. They created a space for learning where I can fail gently, and they pointed a light into the different parts of my mind so that I might grow intellectually and discover my own wingspan. My Hebrew teacher, especially, had gone above and beyond and let us into his life, his hopes and dreams, and his dinner table. And in return, to all the educators who had allowed us into their hearts, I feel like I have given them this version of myself for safe-keeping, for I will never be a student again. How can I bear to say goodbye to the people who showed me my growth, and carries a part of me with them?

On the last day of classes, I tried to stretch out the last few minutes before the clock struck midnight. I don’t want the magic to wear off. It is a bittersweet feeling to accept that I must let go of being a student, because all the education I have received can only start to mean something if I leave this place and carry forward that inspiration in my own capacity of work and life. And so, I let the last day of classes pass, and carry only an armful of grief, a great knot of tangled feelings I cannot express in any of the four languages I know, and a soup recipe to sleep.