Darkroom, Darkroom
We stay up in school till 2/3 am almost every night, trying to finish our work.
Kelle, Amanda, Kevin, Alia, Ferooze, Dilys and I, standing in the darkroom for hours and hours trying to wash the perfect prints for Chee Yong. From 12 pm to 2 am, we stay by our trays and agitate our prints, we rush in and out, developing negatives, enlarging them, waiting for enlargers and on and on. There's always hardly time to sit down and catch a breather.
At the end of it, today was a disaster. The chemicals were somehow not proportioned correctly, and none of the prints came out right. All of them turned yellow in the light, and it was really discouraging. I spent the whole afternoon waiting for an enlarger, developing and getting ready, spending overtime in the darkroom, way after tp was closed, and yet the prints that came out were trash.
So we decided to call it off a bit earlier today, and pray tomorrow we can have time to reprint them.
Our hands smell of the pungent chemicals, our eyes sore. Kelle would fall asleep while agitating, her hand still limply touching her tray. Our fingernails are dry from the acid that eats into our skin. Itchy, red, and sensitive skin dominate the surface of our hands. Extremely exhausted after every night, and yet having to wake up early every morning.
Every night, Kelle, Kevin and I would cab back home together. $7.50 every night spent cabbing home, with pleasure of the midnight surcharge. Extra money on our dinners and snacks and drinks. I'm not given that much for allowance a day, and the cost of living far from school eats slowly into my savings. I wouldn't have any by the end of this week. I'm getting a bad sore throat, but we can't afford to get sick.
This is life for now.
And even though it sounds super crappy and tiring and exasperating, it's great to be able to share it with friends. The times we joke and laugh as we listen to the radio, and singing aloud old songs at night when the school is empty. Playing piggyback, spilling our supposed-cup-noodle-dinners, buying snacks for one another, advising each other on our works.
And while we were busy doing all this, YK passed me a card.
"Thanks for being a great friend for 5-6 years, more to come,"
And it's the little encouragement like this that makes you peservere. :]
Darkroom might sap all of my energy, but it's surprisingly satisfying.
And right now, I'm gonna bring this overworked self to sleep.