Gone...

 Gone are the days when academic excellence meant anything.

Gone are the days when genuine hard work paid off.

Gone are the days when education was refered to as "the best legacy".

Gone are the days when intelligence was attractive.

I yearn for the days when a deliberate positive action, resulting in a spectacular feat, such as graduating with a perfect score of 5.00CGPA, will break the internet. When companies will queue up to endorse such individual. When every newspaper, magazine, channel, blog and platform will put it in our faces for days on end, reiteratting the message, especially to the younger ones, that excellence is achievable and more importantly, rewarding.

How do we encourage the younger ones to sit up academically, when at the end of the day, all they get are handshakes and laptops? There are even no jobs for them after all the toiling. 

Whereas, those who were termed unserious or uneducated take the spot light. They are the Yahoo boys, whose fraudulent ways prove most productive, as they are amongst those who ride the best cars, or the musicians who with a perfect blend of noisiness and vulgarity get the best endorsements and live the best lives. They are the runs babes who fly round the world in private jets, and reside in mansions.

So, how exactly do we get back to the yester years of glory? Is hawking of commodities the new way forward and all it takes?