They say having too many choices is a good problem to have. That may be true but it just feels like I won prizes I can’t now claim because I can’t fit them into my packed summer schedule.

I was at Uniqlo buying another set of black-and-white when my phone pinged with the sound of school email. SAL had assigned me to a criminal lawyer for the criminal practice internship. Unfortunately, it overlapped by one week with the CLAS internship which is overseen by the scary prof and hence I can’t shift my CLAS internship start date (nor would I, because then it would clash with the litigation internship).

Arrrrggggh! One of the most noted lawyers in his field agreeing to let me shadow him for 2 weeks and I had to reply “no” to the offer. There was a “Remarks” field allowing me to explain why, so I suggested alternative dates. One of those alternatives will result in my missing the Mauritius trip if it goes ahead as planned, but Mauritius will always be there, and legal internships are time-sensitive.

Also, Mrs Lee Suet-Fern agreed to an email interview for the Law School Companion, and I’m in charge, so I had to do my research on questions to ask her – repeating questions or asking her mundane ones shows we can’t be bothered to do research or are just really stupid. Her specialty is corporate law, and it would seem completely at odds to me that she would find such a dry subject interesting. As I read on, however, I started to understand why she enjoyed it so much. It’s not about the subject matter being companies and securities and rules. She enjoyed the intellectual challenge of solving problems in this field, and I suppose I need to shift my mindset – that of seeing corporate law as another set of tools, rather than the dry, somewhat impersonal aspect of law that it seems to be when compared to criminal practice or family law.

Exams are over! And somehow I’ve signed up for more than my fair share of pro bono hours – I secured an internship with the Criminal Legal Aid Scheme which would already fulfil my required 20 hours, but then I was also approved for the Syariah Court Friends programme and that’s another 30+ hours in the bag… And right after the exam, as we were heading out to lunch, the careers office called and said they were nominating me for the coveted litigation internship. I get to shadow a lawyer in court! Fun times, and I suppose it makes up for the disappointment of not securing a “real” law firm internship.

I’m fat and ugly and hopelessly unfit, and also awkward as hell now that I don’t bother to hide it, but I wouldn’t switch places with anyone else in the world. Life is good.

(okay maybe if she were a slimmer, prettier version of me with the same personality characteristics, I’d swap)

What does it mean to find your people?

Yesterday, I attended a beach party mostly populated by “internet types” i.e. people who say more online than in real life. I’m sure they weren’t mainstream in the usual sense, but for all that they seemed to really enjoy each other’s company, without the need to feel held back by politeness.

I guess I really envied them that – the freedom to be themselves, comfortable in their own skins without feeling the need to impress anyone. I wish I could do that.

I’ve been thinking about how marketing/advertising exploits our deep-seated insecurities in order to sell us things. This actually began with a dating app called Ivory, when I had an insight that people’s negative reactions to it were just manifestations of their insecurities of being judged as not being elite enough to be invited into the exclusive circle of “ambitious high-achievers”.

And now, because they hit the right buttons – insecurity about social status, insecurity about being forever alone – they’re getting column inches and FB posts. And I looked at the people reacting, like the animal experiments we used to study in Psych 1101E. Not quite like Pavlov’s dogs, not quite pigeons in Skinner boxes… this was a fear reaction.

And I resolved to be more aware of when a fear response is being elicited from me, when my insecurities are being exploited for capitalism. The question to ask now, when considering a purchase, is not “do I need this?” but rather “what problem does this solve?“. Let’s walk through the steps:

Chicken nuggets. They solve the problem of hunger, which is a basic need. I guess the follow-up question is “is there a better way of solving this problem” but my bad dietary choices are a matter for another day.

New lipstick. Solves the problem of not having a matte lipstick in that colour family. Which solves the problem of my being ugly, which will hopefully solve the problem of being forever alone. I guess the desire for deep meaningful relationships is a basic need, but the lipstick is too remote a cause. Do not buy – or at least, be honest about what a mere lipstick can do in terms of helping you feel better about yourself.

I was thinking about how I’ve changed since I entered law school. I think I’m more assertive (naturally), and I think I’ve become more curious about my fellow humans.

I was looking at the ice-cream uncle who has his van at the Chun Tin carpark and I thought maybe someday I should go interview him, ask him how he got started selling ice cream and why he picked this spot (he wasn’t here before).

And I realised that the old pre-law me might never have thought about doing something like that, I certainly never thought about interviewing strangers. I think part of the reason for the change is that there is no escaping your fellow humans in law. For all our reputations as dusty nerds spending all day in the library, law students are actually continually grappling with the failures, brilliance and general interestingness of humanity, case by case. There is no escaping the underlying humanity running through our work. There is no law without humans anyway, who would a hermit rule? Or sue? Or marry, or divorce, or make and break contracts with?

Maybe all this is why lawyers are so fun (and often challenging) to hang out with 🙂