Bar Training, First Week:

1. When was the last time I had NINE subjects at once? (A: the ‘O’ levels, but I am not 16 anymore!) I swear I am exhausted just from filling in my calendar with my list of tutorial dates.

[1a. If anyone cares, they are: the three procedural courses (civil, criminal and family); wills and probate administration; real estate conveyancing; insolvency administration (I rather hope I never have to do this for anyone); intellectual property practice; mock trial; legal ethics; and a general skills-based course (drafting, negotiations, client management etc), plus a project (each of us is to manage a client file throughout the next 3 months in a simulated exercise.)]

2. Course Director, going through housekeeping matters:

‘We expect our students to dress like professionals! Don’t show up looking like vagabonds!’

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Don’t take the furniture out of the courtrooms! Every year we tell you not to do it and someone will do it! I’m telling you that this year if we catch you you will wish you’d never been born! There are CCTVs. And this year, we will even turn them on!

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3. My body is not used any longer to having my day structured by a centralised authority. At the end of the first week, I am completely beat.