The New Paper Column: Edu

I am secretly convinced that someone has arranged for a robotic spy to masquerade as my roommate at New York University.

We have both been in New York City for two months now, and my roommate, whom we shall call Caleb, has watched exactly one movie, zero plays, and zero Broadway or off-Broadway shows. In fact, not counting a day walking along Fifth Avenue, his exploration of Manhattan has not exceeded a five-block radius from the NYU campuses.

But it’s not what he hasn’t done that convinces me he is on someone’s payroll. It’s what he has done. For almost every single day now, he has managed to cram in ten-hour reading sessions at the library, in addition to writing papers in our room afterwards.

He even makes disagreeable noises when I’m slacking. Yes, he is even more Singaporean than I am. This is why I am convinced that he is a spy.

As for why I am convinced that he is a robot, just consider this. He has not touched the X-box, nor the Gamecube, nor the Playstation 2 in our suite’s common room once, and if I didn’t switch on the TV in our room occasionally, I am fairly sure that he wouldn’t even have watched a single second of TV. I’m sure you agree that there is simply no way he is even remotely human.

Of course, realizing that you are sleeping (in the same room) with a robotic spy who is likely taking note of your every action is enough to make anyone slightly paranoid. In fact, it is so paranoia-inducing that I’ve taken to recording down my own movements, grades, and time-management in multiple Excel spreadsheets.

Just in case he has managed somehow to install recording devices in my classrooms, I have also taken to shaking my head and making disapproving sounds whenever my professors and schoolmates say and do anything offensive.

When my classmate, who was asked to write and present a monologue, came to class dressed as a transvestite, and described things that even the Karma Sutra would blush at, I tsk-tsked and told him afterwards (just in case the camera was watching) how wrong his monologue was.

When my Terrorism And The Modern Man professor suggested that al-Qaeda’s actions and ideology were understandable, though not tolerable, I almost left the room (I didn’t, because grades are lowered for every two absences).

Even when I’m walking to my classes, I take care to keep a wide distance from those people protesting against either political party, against various laws, against the ban on marijuana as medicine, against student fee hikes, and just in case, even protests against Starbucks. I’ve seen Terminator: Rise Of The Machines, and if Kristanna Loken can be a shape-shifting T-X, then so can my ‘roommate’, right?

I have to admit, though, that all this looking over my shoulder is making me very tired, cranky, and careless. Just the other day I almost cracked and started paying attention when my Literature professor claimed that Hamlet is a badly constructed play, and in the next breath advised us to read Salman Rushdie’s books.

So I’m thinking that maybe I should transfer back to Singapore for a semester or two. I miss the food, I miss my family, and I miss my friends. And more than all of those things I miss the stress of simply having to study and not worry about anything else, especially about why my ‘roommate’ is now staring at me.

What do you guys think?