She checked the message and smiled, as her manicured fingers typed something quickly to the sender. At the second beep of the phone, she dashed out from the auditorium to a waiting limousine in front of the main university library.
A rich-looking man in his fifties or even sixties stepped out to usher the young lady into the rear of the limo—in real Hollywood style. Like the Knight in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, they sped off from the university environment for what seemed like a fun ride or a romantic getaway.
It was 3pm and we had just completed a lecture on public international law. Usually, she will not attend lectures or will leave in the middle of an exciting class when her phone rang. She was not your average student; she made university education look particularly easy, affordable and pleasurable.
That was Jessica, my friend in university years ago in London. She lived a comfortable, mostly extravagant life in an expensive apartment close to the campus. She had a brand new car that she hardly drove because she was often whisked away in big cars by senior executives of big conglomerates and companies. We loved Julia Roberts for her phenomenal portrayal of the aggressive opportunist in Pretty Woman.
Julia wanted the good life at any cost, and was prepared to make big compromises to achieve the dream. Jessica was very beautiful, intelligent and had big dreams. She found it strategic to use what she had to get what she wanted in life. She was also smart to know that there is hardly a free lunch anywhere these days. She was an adult and needed no permission to have sex. If the old men could offer what a young man of her age could not provide in a decade, she would bear with the baldness of their hair and the wrinkles on their wrists, to live large on their pot bellies.
