Transmission 4 - Life Journey
May 29, 2021
When I went to college, it seemed to me that most of my peers were in pretty much the same situation as I was. It was I think, an end of an era, the era of student radicalization and awareness of the inequalities of the system. The students I knew were mostly scruffy and poor and lived in poor accommodation. Much later, when I began working in a University, I suddenly noticed the shift to luxury both in student accommodation and dress. There were more students than ever, and a lot of these appeared very affluent students. There was also a huge effort on the part of the university or at least speculators affiliated with the university, to cater to the richer student. So luxury accommodation close to the university sprung up, with all sorts of amenities that I had never dreamt of as a student. Certain, affluent students were, I thought, being treated like a commodity. Like valued customers rather than young minds to be guided and shaped. When considering this seeming change in the student lifestyle, I began to wonder how someone like me would fare in the modern university system. And of course, projecting this onto a planet-sized university where a poor student's accommodation might be miles from the lecture block (or lecture island in the case of U-Life), gave rise to all sorts of ridiculous ideas of what would happen on the journey to an ordinary everyday lecture.
The tone of the narration is deeply ironic, using the sort of euphemistic language a brochure might make when trying to avoid mentioning the reality of status on the University. There is also an element of revenge on callous local bus drivers who had often kicked me off for not having the correct change, leaving me stranded and unable to get home for hours.
This is a two-part story. I hope you'll read the next transmission to find out what happens to poor Globak; if he manages to reach his lecture and of course, what becomes of the more fortunate Swerthy F'Bramm.
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The University of Life
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The University of Life is an ongoing comedy sci-fi comic strip set on a planet-sized university of the far future. ULIFE (or Monica, if you wish to give it a more personal name) hosts a wide range of diverse and interesting life-forms and as such, constantly has to face the challenge of ensuring that the needs of every different and contrasting life-form are met. It is a place where, just as one being’s sandwich is another being’s poison, so one being’s soppy hug is another being’s murder. Despite the potential for chaos this extreme diversity could cause, ULIFE / Monica is a relatively peaceful planet, possessing neither a regular police force or army. In fact, apart from the 522,601 statutes governing the use of computers, there are practically no rules to govern the inhabitants' lives. Of course, underneath the peaceful veneer, all sorts of crimes and skulduggery persist. and the apparent interest in diversity is really just a cynical mix of penny-pinching and public relations.
The overall tone of the stories is satirical, poking fun, jibes and a big alien tongue at various ‘unfair’ institutions such as unfeeling bureaucracies, as well as examining the difficulties faced by the underdog, unglamorous, ordinary pedestrian universal creature who has to put up with the unfairness.
The University is the star and although there are regularly reoccurring characters, there are no regular characters … at the moment.
This is a civilised and bureaucratic, harmless but still action and adventure-packed story in the mould of greater works such as The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the Discworld novels and Blyton’s Mallory Towers. And though tragedy and farce occur, laughter in the face of adversity is the most common feature.
So strap in, switch on, unhook your comms unit, put your feet up or seven of them at least, and enjoy your adventures on the University of Life.
The overall tone of the stories is satirical, poking fun, jibes and a big alien tongue at various ‘unfair’ institutions such as unfeeling bureaucracies, as well as examining the difficulties faced by the underdog, unglamorous, ordinary pedestrian universal creature who has to put up with the unfairness.
The University is the star and although there are regularly reoccurring characters, there are no regular characters … at the moment.
This is a civilised and bureaucratic, harmless but still action and adventure-packed story in the mould of greater works such as The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the Discworld novels and Blyton’s Mallory Towers. And though tragedy and farce occur, laughter in the face of adversity is the most common feature.
So strap in, switch on, unhook your comms unit, put your feet up or seven of them at least, and enjoy your adventures on the University of Life.
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