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Anyone close to me will swear that I am an ultimate Big Brother fan. I followed the exploits of Uma, Cass, Jayson, Nene and company, and now I virtually run to my dorm from school to keep tabs on what Mich, Keanna, Zanjoe (oh Zanjoe!), Aleck and the others are doing. Is it because I like spying on people, or because I want to be an artista too? At first I don’t know, but it’s one guilty pleasure I don’t mind admitting.

But recently I realized why I can relate to this show - it’s kind of like how our (unidentified, baka ma-kick out pa ako) school works. The Big Brother show began with fourteen housemates who get voted out weekly. In law school, we started out with 14 sections, then dwindled to seven sections in second year, five in third year, and will only be two sections in the fourth year.  Big Brother tells his housemates what to do or they will be punished. We are told to study or else, we are humiliated when we don’t give decent answers in recitation, or worse, are failed in a subject. Big Brother imprisons his housemates for a hundred days, fifty-seven for the celebrity housemates. We are virtually imprisoned by law books (though not directly compelled, involuntary servitude na yun).

Still, there are differences…when the housemates leave the house, they are given prizes. With us, I don’t know what rewards await us when we are kicked out. Also, Big Brother (the voice akin to Charlie from a squawk box in Charlie’s Angels) reigns supreme. In law school, I don’t know who exactly gives us the orders…mostly it would be the profs who tell us what to do, and what we will read, eat and dream about for the next days or weeks, but it may be our parents, our friends, and of course, ourselves. Big Brother also fosters a causal relationship - you do this, I give you this. You rescued a stuffed toy from a tree, have P10,000 or a lifetime supply of detergent or something. With us, there are absolutely no explanations. Case in point: I study a topic with heart and soul and (hungry) stomach which the next day will be asked of my classmate, while I get asked on a topic I merely glanced at. Still, there are days when I know nothing but deliver a recitation worthy of a Nobel Prize (hmmm, kelan yun?). And we say goodbye to friends we know are more intellectually gifted than us. It’s sad.

This analogy helped me understand why my heart broke during the first eviction episodes although I kept thinking, hello, you already have careers and you will get out of that fishbowl existence. For us, though, we cannot even predict if we will graduate from this school we are almost ready to die for. I knew it was going to be difficult, but nobody told me (or my classmates) that we would sacrifice time, relationships, finances, sanity, and all else in between. Then one would ask, then why are you still in that big other house? Is it really for the sole pursuit of that ever elusive ATTORNEY to your name?

I don’t know, but I (and my schoolmates) still star in it five days a week, 4:30 to 9:30pm. Catch us while you can, baka next sem, ibang network na kami.