The Curriculum Vitae is often considered to be one of the most important documents in the life of a law school student, the sum of all his/her efforts. Sometimes though, a few discrepancies sink in between fact and fiction. In this mildly cynical piece, The Diarist tells you what a CV might say and what it might hide.

“It says here you were Runners Up at the national rounds of the Big Crazy International Moot. What did you learn from it?”

What did I learn from it? I learnt that there are periods in your life that you will be sitting on the staircase of your hostel at three in the morning with a pen in your hand, your right thigh covered in blue scribbles and your head screaming in exhaustion, physically aching for the memory of the one damn case that you just know will transform your memo.

I learnt to get past the incredible disgust I would feel when I eventually discovered that that the judgment was 1921, Lahore High Court.

I said, “Mooting helped me develop my research skills.”

I learnt that tobacco has the insane ability to convert a hesitant, unwieldy draft into a thing of crystal beauty. I learnt that the trek up the grubby staircase to the fourth floor, the 2am knock on Mama’s door, the first drag – God, that first drag, where the white calm seeps like cold spring water from in between your eyes to the very tips of your inkstained fingers… - would be the beginning of a love affair it would take four painful years to end.

The smell of stale smoke mixed with Maggi, the steady beam of moonlight creeping into the dirty room, the crinkling of Mama’s bloodshot eyes in the yellow lamplight, the sound of his scratchy laughter as he made obscene jokes involving rebus sic stantibus.. I learnt that this tableau would be carved into my head as though in stone.

I said, “Planning and coordination become very important, so you learn to function effectively in a team.”

I learnt that the moment before “And the winner of the final round is…” smells like sweat. I learnt that the moment after it tastes like bile.

I said, “Hard work is very important, but luck too has a huge role to play.”

He said, “Fair enough.”

Flip page - “Why have you applied to a corporate law firm when your last three internships have been in litigation?”

Why indeed. I thought I would love litigation – I think, in spite of everything, I did - but as many young men and women have discovered to their consternation, love is sometimes not enough.

I learnt that the road to justice is paved with twenty rupee notes. I learnt that two floors down and ten feet from the velvet pomp of Courtroom Number 1, would be two short lines of undertrials (petty offences) being released from confinement. “Now be a good citizen and don’t steal again”, the official would say perfunctorily to each man being released. I learnt that a voluble policeman will admit to a personable intern that a full one-third of the men in line had been falsely imprisoned to improve arrest records.

I learnt that “upar se pressure tha…” sounds like an unhappy ending and feels like a sock to the gut.

I learnt that one of the worst discoveries an idealistic nineteen year old can make about himself, is that he does not have the stomach for unhappy endings.

I said, “I discovered through my internships that my interests did not lie in advocacy and were more oriented towards transactional law.”

“Would you think your skills have been enhanced by going for…” he looks at my CV, “the Garvard Model United Nations you attended last year?”

No, actually. I credit the Garvard MUN for my discovery of three new and delightful kinds of alcohol (pale ale, where have you been all my life?), and also for the realisation that it is not ‘witty’ to match a top hat with swimming trunks.

I learnt that ‘international relations’ basically means that you have to quit whining and share your candy with the Brazilian contingent.

To be sure, certain more politically conscious souls than I claimed to have reached a theoretical solution to intellectual property crises in Southeast Asian countries, but my own brain remained blissfully impervious to any improvement.

I said - “MUNs teach youngsters the value of international cooperation; I was able to meet students from all across the world and gain their perspective on globally significant issues.”

“We are pleased to offer you a position with our firm,” he said, “Please wear a tie.”

* * *

My CV, at its longest, was two sides long. It remains to this day the most difficult document I have ever put my name to. You are your CV, my seniors told me; no matter how much I fiddled with my CV, I found it hard to believe that I was. When I emailed my CVs to firms, I would often wonder how much of the story they could see behind it; I wondered if the people who read it had the imagination to join all the bullet points and come up with a real, live person.

Either way - I had with myself one single, beat up paper copy of my CV that I used for the entire campus recruitment process. The day I got a job I tore it up and threw it away.

This August will mark the beginning of a new life with endless possibilities that will not be circumscribed by old limitations; the bullet points will be gone, only the ghosts behind them will linger.. old, secret friends.