The rain started just as our bus pulled into the university forecourt, a sudden curtain of water that turned the sandstone buildings into blurry monuments. Our guide, a third-year Arts student with a rehearsed smile, gestured for us to hurry under the portico. I remember thinking how symbolic it felt—this grand institution, supposedly welcoming, yet the first thing it did was keep us at a distance, sheltering us from the very thing that would later define my visit. My mother had bought me a new jacket for this tour, navy blue and water-resistant, but it didn't stop the damp from creeping into my collar. The other thirteen Year 12 students from my school shuffled beside me, clutching brochures that were already curling at the edges. We were all from the same public school in the western suburbs, and the contrast between our lives and this manicured campus could not have been starker.
The guide led us through the cloisters, her voice competing with the drumming on the roof. She pointed out the library, the lecture theatres, the student union—all impressively large, all slick with rain. I tried to imagine myself here, a full-time student among the throngs, but the fantasy kept slipping. Every time I pictured sitting in those clean, bright rooms, I saw the stack of bills on our kitchen table at home, the late-night shifts my mother worked. The tour felt like a performance, and we were the audience, expected to applaud the architecture and the opportunity. But the rain made everything grey, and I could not shake the feeling that I was being sold something I could not afford. My classmate Jamal whispered to me, 'This place is like a museum. Do you think they let people like us touch the exhibits?' I laughed, but it was hollow.
At the engineering building, we stopped for a brief demonstration. A professor showed us a prototype of a water turbine, explaining how it harvested kinetic energy from rainfall. I watched the water cascading into the model and thought about how the same resource—rain—could be harnessed for power, or could just soak through your shoes on a three-kilometre walk to the bus stop. Context, I realised, determined everything. In this university, rain was a technical challenge to be solved. At home, it was a perpetual reminder of leaking roofs and cancelled plans. Our guide seemed oblivious to the irony, moving us along to the next building, her umbrella a symbol of the privilege that kept her dry while we huddled together, sharing the damp.
Every time I pictured sitting in those clean, bright rooms, I saw the stack of bills on our kitchen table at home, the late-night shifts my mother worked.
The turning point came when we entered the science atrium, a vast glass dome that amplified the sound of rain into a dull roar. Our guide encouraged us to ask questions. A girl from a selective school in the eastern suburbs raised her hand and asked about scholarships. The guide gave a polished answer about merit-based awards and financial aid packages. I looked around at my classmates, most of whom were first in their families to consider university. Merit, I thought, what a strange word. It assumes a level playing field when the rain was falling heavier on some of us than on others. I wanted to ask whether the scholarships covered a new laptop, a reliable car, the hours of lost work. But I said nothing. The power imbalance between the guide and us, between the university and our community, felt too vast to bridge with a question.
During the free exploration time, I wandered away from the group. I found a small courtyard with a concrete bench under a tree. The leaves provided some cover, but not much. I sat down, letting the rain mist my face. I thought about my father, who had wanted to be an engineer but dropped out of school at sixteen to support his family. I thought about the years of homework done at the kitchen table, the books borrowed from the local library, the essays written on a slow computer. Every step I had taken to get here felt like an uphill climb, and yet here I was, sitting in the rain, wondering if I even belonged. The cold seeped into my bones, but for the first time all day, I felt awake. The rain was not an obstacle; it was a mirror, reflecting the inequalities that I had always known but never named.
A student walked past me, a young woman carrying a stack of books under a plastic cover. She stopped under a nearby awning and began to read, seemingly undeterred by the weather. I watched her for a minute, this person for whom the university was simply her everyday life. She had no need to be impressed by a tour; she was already inside. I realised then that the tour was not for me to decide if I wanted this university; it was for the university to decide if I was worthy. And the rain, by revealing the cracks in my confidence, had done me a favour. It had stripped away the romanticised version of higher education and shown me the harsh reality: that access was not just about grades, but about the unspoken advantages that kept some people dry and others wet.
When the bus pulled away that afternoon, the rain had lightened to a drizzle. I leaned my head against the cold window and watched the campus recede into the grey. My classmates were quiet, each lost in their own thoughts. The tour had not given me a vision of my future; it had given me a question. Would I let this moment of doubt define me, or would I use it as fuel? The power to change my circumstances lay not in this university's acceptance letter, but in my willingness to keep walking, even in the rain. I pulled out my phone and typed a note: 'The rain falls on everyone, but not everyone gets wet the same way.' That became my mantra for the rest of the year, a reminder that context shapes opportunity, and that the first step to power is recognising the storm for what it is.