Tea

Spent an afternoon in Aberdeen - I was the invigilator of the Part I examination.

Alas, the examination consisted of two MCQ papers, each for three hours, with an hour of break in between. There were three invigilators: a consultant geriatrician, a representative from the British Council, and myself.

During the break, the secretaries from the College - whose office was upstairs - came and helped collecting the paper.

"Do you need to order some snack in the canteen ?" One of them suggested, "It would be lucky if we could leave before 7:30 PM."

I duly complied. Two hours later, I took a 15-minute break and went to the canteen.

No one was there.

Oh, there was one - a waitress. She recognized me immediately and gave me a bowel of noodle - that's my afternoon tea.

Hastily I finished with my break - there's a sense of uneasiness to eat alone in a huge canteen.

On my way back, I couldn't wave away that very question in my mind: How could this business survive ?

PS. After the examination, the lady from the British Council asked how senior those candidate doctors were.

"You know, a few of them asked me what did Surname and Initials mean ..." She pointed to me a small area of the answer sheet.