Before the placement drive

Tomorrow 200 of us

sit in the same hall

and try to prove

we are worth hiring.

Tonight my roommate is asleep

and I am revising hash maps

for the fourth time this week

as if repetition is the same as understanding.

I know this problem.

I've solved it before.

Why does the screen

look like a foreign language tonight.

Somewhere in this hostel

someone is also awake,

doing the same thing,

feeling the same way.

I don't know who.

But I am glad they exist.